12 Christmases
by Could Not Think of a Good Name
Summary: Wouldn't you love to see how Christmas is celebrated in each region of the pokemon world? No. Too easy. How about seeing how Christmas is celebrated in each region of two different pokemon universes? Join me as we take a peek into a few different Christmases in both the mangaverse and the animeverse. Happy Holidays from Ash and Red!
1. M-Shopping with Red

**Important things about this fanfiction:** **If you are reading this, chances are that you are also in the process of reading my current major fic, **_**Pokemon Adventures: AshGray Chapter (**_**if not, enjoy my shameless plug in)****. In such a case, you are likely at least somewhat familiar with my overall tone and style of writing. For starters, I am a huge fan of pretty much anything **_**Pokemon**_** related, but the anime and the manga (**_**Pokemon Special**_**) are the two things that I enjoy writing the most. I am not from Japan, and I grew up reading a very Americanized version of **_**Pokemon Special.**_** That being said, I typically refer to the manga as **_**Pokemon Adventures**_**, and in my stories, Blue is the boy character, while Green is the girl character. I realize that in this case, I am in the minority on this website, but I just find it easier. My ships typically follow the most canonical romances I can find. However, seeing the sheer amount of characters that I will be dealing with in this fic, I will simply direct you to my profile page for a semi-complete list of ships that may or may not appear in these one-shots. Next, I would like to point out how the chapters are sorted in this fanficiton. Since I am dealing with multiple universes in this fic, every chapter that takes place in the manga universe will be preceded by an M, while every chapter that takes place in the anime universe will be preceded by an A. If the chapter deals with neither universe, it will be preceded by a 0. If the chapter deals with both universes, it will be preceded by an M and an A. Lastly, I must mention that, while this fanfiction is designed to fit into both respective canons quite easily, I have made no attempt to find out when any of the stories take place. That being said, Red's story may take place at any point from Volume 1 of **_**Pokemon Adventures**_** to the distant future, not yet touched by the manga. The same goes for Ash. There is also no reason to believe that each story takes place on the same Christmas. I know it is all very chaotic, but that is the beauty of Christmas. You just don't need a lot of context to know that it is still going to be the most wonderful time of the year. :)  
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**Chapters for this fic will be uploaded daily, until it is finished. Merry Christmas, everybody! :)  
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******I do not own or have any rights to any part of the Pokemon franchise whatsoever. **

* * *

**Shopping with Red****  
**

"You've got to be sure to make it!" She said

"Viridian Forest is beautiful on Christmas Eve!" She said.

And now he was going to ruin it. I mean, it was not Red's fault, and he was not going to ruin it _on purpose_, but at this point, he was pretty sure he was going to ruin it.

The young pokemon trainer ran down the streets of Viridian City as fast as he could. His blue jeans were clinging tightly to his legs as he ran, and his red jacket flapped in the wind, because he didn't even bother zipping the thing before he left the Indigo Plateau.

"Pika-Pika?" asked the small electric mouse that ran beside him.

"I'm not really sure." Red admitted, as he adjusted the red cap on his head, "What time do you think the holiday rush actually starts?"

"Pikachu." He replied.

Red had been at the Plateau all day that day. The reporters needed him there. They were doing some kind of late holiday article about the decade's last pokemon champions. Red liked the publicity and all, but the only reason he actually showed up to the interview was for the money. He was surprisingly short on it this holiday season, and if he wanted to show up with _anything_ for Yellow's party tonight, he needed that money.

Red flipped out his pokegear, as he continued running down the street.

"Okay, it's 5:30!" he said with a sigh, "That gives me exactly half an hour to pick everybody up a gift and get to the Viridian forest… provided the stores aren't already sold out of absolutely everything."

"Chu!" his pokemon agreed.

Red hated it when stuff like this happened. He had planned everything out perfectly. He knew exactly what he was going to get each friend. He knew the exact price of each gift. He had even made sure that the interview was scheduled several hours in advance, so that he could get to the store in time. Things just did not work out quite right. The interview ended up taking, like, a million times longer than it was supposed to. Now, Red was late.

"CHA!" Pika shouted to his master, bringing him back to reality.

Red looked up ahead of himself. A big blue building was coming up on the left.

"Bingo!" Red cheered. That was just the shop he was looking for.

Once he finally approached the store, the champion ground to a halt and burst through the door as fast as he could.

The inside was worse than he expected. He looked around to find customers, employees, children, and even pokemon running everywhere in the building. There was chaos up and down every isle. Some people were _literally_ jumping over one another to get to the register. All of the sudden, Red worried that his life might actually be in danger here.

"Oookay…" he muttered, as he pulled a small shopping list out of his jacket pocket, "I'm going to need a plan B."

"Pikachu!" Pika exclaimed, as he jumped up on his trainer's shoulder and leaned in to see the note.

"Does it really matter?" Red asked, "There is no way I can get all of this stuff in time. Each present is in a completely different part of the store, and with all of this craziness happening, it could take me forever to check out."

"Pika!" the rodent insisted, as it grabbed the list from his hand.

Red's handwriting was fairly easy to make out, and the list itself wasn't hard to follow either.

_Macho Brace- Blue_

_Florella Designer Scarf- Green_

_Nature's Drawing Kit- Yellow_

_XPK Skateboard- Gold_

_Pokewatcher Upgrade- Crys_

'_Of Battles and Trades'- Silver_

"Pikachu?" the pokemon asked, motioning to Yellow's gift.

Red shrugged. "She's always telling me about how beautiful nature is and how she wishes she could just sit down and sketch it all out. I figured I might as well help her learn how."

"Achu." He agreed, "Pika Pika. Pi Pikachu!"

"Really? You'll go and get that one for me?" Red confirmed with a smile.

"Pika!" he assured.

"Great! Thank you so much, Pi-" Red stopped himself mid-sentence.

"Wait a second…" he murmured, "That gives me a great idea!"

With that, Red pulled four pokeballs out of his backpack and threw them all into the air.

"VENASAUR!" "POLIWRATH!" "ESPION!" "SNOOORLAAAX!" The pokemon each greeted him as they popped out.

"Alright everybody! We're last minute Christmas shopping, okay?" he announced, as he ripped his list into six separate pieces, "I need each of you to go to your section of the store and find the gift on the list that I give you."

He handed a ripped sliver of paper out to each of his pokemon, keeping one for himself.

"Meet me at the register as soon as you find what you are looking for, okay?"

"VEN!" "Poli!" "Pika! "Pion!" "SNORLAX!" they each agreed.

"Okay, break!" Red screamed, allowing each pokemon to run off in its own direction.

"I sure hope this works out." He said to himself, "Yellow, I'll be at your place in no time!"

* * *

Poli jumped through the isles in search of Red's gift. The pokemon was not entirely sure which section of the store held skateboards, but his legs were strong enough to allow him to simply bound over the selves until he found it.

Poli would jump into one isle (effectively terrifying every human in sight), look for any skateboards, and then jump right into the next isle. It couldn't take long to go through the store that way, right? Wrong. Unfortunately, something Poli failed to take into account was visibility. With all of the chaotic humans running around, looking for their last minute gifts, the pokemon could not always make out exactly what items were on each isle without having to run up and down the shelves a little bit. This was costing time, and Poli knew his trainer was late. He had to think of a different approach.

The pokemon looked up at the ceiling for a moment. He noticed that all of the lighting in the store was provided by those large, industrial sized lights that one often finds in warehouses. That was his ticket.

"Poli!" the creature grunted, as he jumped to the top of one of the isle shelves that he had been bounding over before. When he landed, he made one final leap to the industrial light that he noticed, grabbing onto the cord that hung it from the ceiling.

Poli peered through the isles with his new bird's-eye view until he noticed a rack of skateboards on the east side of the store. That was just what he needed. He swung the lighting fixture a little bit, slowly building up momentum like a child on a swing until he finally let it go and launched himself right over to they toy that he needed. Too easy.

* * *

Saur was having a harder time. After all, venasaurs were not exactly known for their great speed or jumping ability. All the pokemon could really hope to do was stomp his way to the isle that he thought held macho braces.

Saur was headed the right way, but humans kept running by and bumping into him. Didn't these people have any manners? Why would all of the humans even want to have a ritual where they came to the store and beat each other up over items they were going to have to pay ridiculous amounts of money for? Couldn't they just have a more peaceful or relaxing ritual? Humans didn't make since to Saur. But, then again, maybe this is where they got the idea for pokemon battles! This sure looked like a pokemon battle. Humans were running, jumping over each other, hitting each other, and letting out massive battle cries. It kind of made since now.

The grass-type just kept slowly stomping to the "Training Items" isle. He was kind of worried about the deadline Red was on, but what else could Saur do?

That's when he saw it. Saur looked around the store for only a second, and he realized that some humans were using tiny cages to move their items with. Tiny cages _with wheels_!

"Vena!" he cried with excitement.

Saur had already determined that this was quite like battling. So, he was sure the humans would not mind if he just took their cage-cars away from them.

"Saur!" he shouted, as he shot a vine whip out to snatch a cage away from a female human about two isles over.

"Hey!" she shouted back at him.

"Venasaur!" he greeted with a smile. He really loved it when humans waved at him. At least that human was a good sport about shop-battling or whatever Red had called it.

Saur looked in his new cage-car to find it filled with toys, candy, and basically a bunch of utterly useless stuff. That would not do. He was hoping the cage-car could give him a ride to the macho brace he needed. Oh well, the problem was easily fixed. He simply turned the cage over and spilled all of its items out.

"Poliwrath!" he heard from behind him. Saur put his project on pause and turned a little bit to find his good friend Poli standing behind him on a skateboard.

"Wrath?" the pokemon asked curiously, while tilting his head to the side a bit.

"Venasaur!" he explained, pointing to the other cage-cars in the store. It was clear that they were going to need a few more of those if they wanted Saur to actually be able to ride on one.

"Poliwrath!" his friend nodded, as he ran over to a couple other humans and took their cage-cars.

Saur continued to contribute by reaching out with a few more vine whips, and once they had a decent number of empty cage-cars, the pokemon tied them all together with a final vine whip attack and hopped on.

"Ven! Ven!" Saur suggested, and Poli complied by focus punching the giant cage-car, allowing Saur to roll to his isle at top speed.

* * *

Meanwhile, Snor was going through the book isle. Snor did not particularly like this isle, as he could not read very well. He was a pokemon, after all. He was just hoping he could read well enough to find the book that Silver wanted… _Of Battles and Trades_. The task could not be too hard. All he had to do was match the shape of the letters on his paper sliver with the shape of the letters on the book.

Snor squinted his eyes a bit. If only the different fonts and colors didn't make it so hard. Maybe Red chose the wrong pokemon for this. Snor would have rather picked out some sort of… food.

Hey! There was an idea! Maybe Snor could go over to a food isle, snack on a few hundred pounds of human food, and then return to the book! Brilliant!

"Snor!" The pokemon grunted with a smile, as it wandered over to the produce section in search of brain food.

* * *

"Finally!" Red sighed, as he got to the front of the line in the software department.

A skinny bald man sat behind the counter with a smile on his face.

"Why hello there!" the man said, "How may I help you?"

"Yeah, hi!" Red started in a rushed tone, "Please tell me that you still have the Pokewatcher upgrade for pokegear!"

The man looked at the boy with a hint of worry. "Are you okay, son?" he asked.

"Yes, I'm fine." Responded Red, "I'm just a little late for a party, and my pokemon are running loose around the store. Please tell me you have that upgrade!"

The man lingered for only a second longer before saying, "Yeah, sure. We have the card right here." He handed Red a small data chip wrapped in plastic, "The total price will be-"

"Sorry!" Red said, as he snatched the present from the man, "I'm gonna have to pay for it up front! Gotta save a spot in line!"

He ran from the software department faster than a rapidash. Time was running out.

* * *

Pika was just on his way back from picking up Yellow's new sketching kit when he saw Snor about to attack a crate of lettuce.

"Pikachu!" The pokemon squeaked (although his voice was a little muffled by the drawing kit in his mouth).

Snor turned around to see his little yellow friend on the ground not far from him.

"Snorlax!" he waved with excitement.

"Pika!" Pika warned him. That lettuce was going to cost Red _a lot_ of money!

"Snor Snor?" the normal-type responded, scratching his head.

"Achu!" Pika assured him. Snor should not have been in the produce section in the first place.

Snor agreed to leave the lettuce alone, but it still didn't make much sense to him. Why would his human have to give away that green paper he was always hording just because Snor ate a few pounds of lettuce? Did Red lose that paper every time Snor ate food? That didn't seem very fair, especially considering that Snor used to eat tons and tons of the stuff every day before he met Red. How long had he accidentally been causing Red to lose his paper?

"Pika-Pikachu!" Pika pointed out, causing Snor to snap out of his thoughts.

That's right! He'd almost forgotten all about that book Red wanted.

"Pikachu!" the little rodent offered, and Snor, knowing very well that Pika was the smarter pokemon, kindly obliged, leading his friend right to the book section.

* * *

Vee knew that designer labels were the types of clothes that had certain pictures on the tags. That was it. Luckily, the little espion also spent enough time around Green to know exactly what picture the Florella label was. Green really loved wearing Florella clothes.

So, as soon as Vee found his way over to the human female clothing section, he used his psychic attack to pick all of the scarves up in the air. While they were still floating, he casually walked underneath each one of them, looking for Green's favorite picture. It did not take too long.

Vee stood underneath the scarf he wanted, and he let his psychic attack stop. All the scarves fell to the floor, except for the one he wanted, which fell on top of him. Perfect.

But before Vee could make it back to his master, he heard a loud screech stop behind him, and he turned around to see his friend Saur riding on some kind of giant cage-car with a macho brace on his head.

"Venasaur!" the pokemon greeted.

Then, behind the grass-type, Poli rounded the corner, carrying a skateboard.

"Poliwrath!" he greeted as well.

"Espi?" Vee asked curiously.

"Venasaur!" Saur explained, as he patted a small spot next to him on the cage-car.

"Espion!" he cheered, as he jumped on next to his friend. Poli concluded the meeting by sending them forward with another focus punch.

* * *

Red was watching his pokegear. This was bad. He had to be at Viridian Forest in ten minutes, and the check out line would not move!

"Next!" chirped the cashier.

Red looked in front of him. Oh. He was the next in line. Never mind.

The trainer walked up to the front and had the cashier scan his upgrade chip across the machine.

"Alright, is that all for you, young man?" she asked with a smile.

"Well, actually…" he muttered, taking a quick look around the room to find his pokemon, "I'm supposed to be meeting someone here…"

"I'm sorry," she responded with a still-cheery voice, "but quite a line is forming behind you. I'm afraid that-"

"WAIT! THERE THEY ARE!" Red cried, as he pointed out into the distance.

Not far from the dex holder, a group of pokemon were stampeding toward the check out line. Pika was riding atop Snor, Vee and Saur were sitting on some contraption made of five or six shopping carts tied together, and Poli was on Gold's new skateboard.

"What on earth?" asked the cashier, but Red did not care how strange it looked. As soon as the pokemon approached the register, Red checked out as fast as humanly possible.

Moments later, the young champion was riding through the streets of Viridian with only five minutes left to get to Yellow's party. He was standing on the skateboard he had bought for Gold with the rest of the gift bags in left hand. His right hand held onto a rope that was being pulled by Aero, as the great prehistoric pokemon flew toward the forest.

"We're gonna make it!" Red yelled with enthusiasm "We're gonna make it!"

He was so proud of everything his pokemon had done to get him this far. He was going to make it to the party on time, _and_ he was going to have everyone's presents. Maybe he hadn't ruined Christmas Eve after all!

It was not long before Aero pulled his trainer into the forest. This was where things got tricky. Red had to stay closer to his skateboard as he traveled over the rocky, snowy plains, and Aero had to stay closer to the ground so that the thick, branchy trees did not hit him in the face.

Things would have continued quite nicely if Red did not by pure chance happen to hit a mound of snow. The collision tossed Red from the skateboard, and his gifts flew everywhere.

Aero only continued on for a moment before realizing what had happened and turning around to help his trainer off of the floor.

"Ugh." Mumbled Red, "What was that?"

"Agraa!" his aerodactyl replied, as Red sat up and looked at his surroundings.

As he turned around the scenery, he realized Yellow was right. Viridian Forest _did_ look beautiful on Christmas Eve. Snow was covering everything in the area, and the newly lit stars reflected off of the wintery blankets. It was powdery and fluffy enough to impress anyone, but on top of that, some of the trees had Christmas lights hung on them. Others were decorated completely. Red was not sure who put all of this stuff on the trees or where the electric wires ran to, but it was definitely a sight.

"Man, you sure took a face plant." Rang a familiar voice.

Red looked behind his back to find Blue standing not 40 feet from him, completely dressed in wintery Christmas clothes, but with his spiky hair still completely visible above his earmuffs.

"Blue?" he asked in disbelief, "Aren't you supposed to be at the party?"

"I was." His friend explained with a chuckle, "It's about 20 yards away from here."

"Oh…" Red sighed a bit, "Dang it! I was so close!"

"Yeah," Blue continued again, as he walked over to his fallen friend, "I was just hanging out with Yellow, Green, and the others when out in the woods there arose such a clatter that I sprang from the couch to see what was the matter!"

Red looked at him with a sarcastic taunt, "I guess you were expecting Santa Claus?"

"Well, I certainly wasn't expecting _you_ with a face full of snow! But, you know what? I found you anyway. Come on inside. Have some hot chocolate."

"Wait!" Red remembered, "I can't go inside yet! I just lost everyone's presents!"

"What are you talking about?" Blue asked, "Just come on in. Everybody's waiting for you."

"Wait!" he said again, "Maybe you can help me, Blue! I'm pretty sure that everyone's stuff is just lying in some of the bushes and tall grass around here. If you can help me dig around for them-"

"Hold that thought." Blue interrupted, "I'll be right back."

And with that, the boy jogged off into the forest, leaving Red to ponder where he was going.

It was only a few minutes later that _several_ voices began to approach the area from the same direction that Blue went.

"Come on, Blue! What _is it_?" Yellow's voice asked with anticipation.

"You'll see." Blue answered, "But it's gonna be a good one!"

"It better be!" came Green's voice, " You know I _always _hate surprises, and I'm gonna be ticked if I came out in the cold for nothing!"

Sure enough, Blue found his way into the clearing that Red was in, and as he parted the branches to a few trees, he said, "Ta-da! Look, guys! There's your surprise! Look who it is!"

Red peered through the branches to see Yellow, Green, Gold, Silver, and Crystal looking back at him. At first, the group seemed confused, but as soon as they saw Red, their faces lit up with excitement. Each dex holder smiled, and they ran into the clearing to greet their friend.

"There you are!" Said Yellow, as she helped pick him up from the floor, "I was wondering when you were going to get here!"

"Alright! Red! Welcome to the party!" cheered Gold, "Glad you could make it!"

"Nice to see you again." Said Silver, as he patted Red on the back, "Not a bad surprise at all."

"I'll say!" Crystal chimed in, "Why don't you join us inside for some karaoke?"

"Uh… I'd love to." Red smiled.

"Not so fast!" added Green in a teasing voice, as she grabbed Red by the arm, "Let me show you to the mistletoe first."

Red blushed at that. He knew Green was joking, but she was just good at embarrassing him.

"Hold on! Hold on!" Blue interrupted, "There is more than enough of Red to go around, but first, I've got to ask a very serious question."

The dex holders all looked at Blue.

"Yellow, when are we opening presents?" he finished.

"Oh… Ya know, whenever." She shrugged.

Blue then looked at Red with a snarky smile and a tilt of the head, as if to say 'Do you get my point?'

Red only laughed in response, and the dex holders all went inside to enjoy each others company. Red would dig around in the grass some other time.


	2. A-The Worst Christmas Eve Ever

**So, I would like to start off this chapter by thank****ing all of you readers for the positive response that last chapter received. Tbh, I did not think it was my best work, and it was hard to write from the perspective of pokemon, which was kind of the theme of the last round. However, if you guys liked it, I'm glad it worked out. Maybe I'm a little too hard on myself sometimes. It had some funny moments, some nice dialogue, and a good message at the end. I hope you will find this one to be the same. Merry Christmas, day 2! :D**

******I do not own or have any rights to any part of the Pokemon franchise whatsoever. **

* * *

**The Worst Christmas Eve Ever**

"I'm sorry," said Officer Jenny, "But there is just no way that I can let you three out there right now."

The officer was dressed in heavy snow gear, and she occasionally found it hard to move around in the suit, but she still had her badge on her jacket and her gun at her side so she was not about to let three young trainers go wandering off into the wilderness on their own.

"Come on!" Ash pled, his gloves clasped together, "If we don't get over to the next town, I won't be able to get home in time for Christmas!"

"Again. I'm sorry," the officer insisted, "But orders are orders. The snowstorm that's about to blow through here is just too big for me to allow anyone in Viridian Forest at this point, especially little kids like you."

"Hey! I'm not little!" Ash shot back in an irritated tone, "I've traveled lots of places before!"

"Ash, she never questioned your 'traveling expertise'" Misty chimed in, "She just said we were too young."

Ash turned around to look his redheaded friend in the eyes. She was wearing a decent sized yellow jacket with a beanie and earmuffs over her head. Her gloved hands wrapped around a tiny Eevee.

"And to be honest," she continued, "Officer Jenny kind of has a point. You're only sixteen."

"So?!" Ash started again, "You're only sixteen too!"

"Ugh. I am not!" she shot back, "I turned seventeen three whole months ago, Ash! How could you have forgotten that already?!"

"Hold on, hold on, guys." The third trainer interrupted, "Let me try to handle this."

The young man was wrapped in a heavy red jacket with a green scarf around his neck and a hood over his head. His eyes were so bent, that some would suggest they were shut all together. He walked over to Officer Jenny with a slight hop in his step, and he leaned over to the woman's ear ever so slightly.

"Hey." He began, "My name's Brock. How about you let me and my friends here pass through to Pallet Town just this once? It can be a… special exception."

He smiled at the woman with a twinkle in both his eye and his teeth to seal the deal.

"Again." The officer sighed, "I cannot let _anyone_ through here! The weather is about to get far too harsh for trainers to pass through. Even if you weren't a group of kids, there would be nothing I could do for you."

"Oh well…" Ash moaned as he slumped his shoulders over in defeat, "I guess we'll have to spend the night here."

"Pikachu…" his electric mouse sadly squeaked in agreement.

"Wait a minute!" Brock suggested, leaning in closer to Officer Jenny, "If you let us through, I can make it worth your while."

The woman's eyes narrowed on the teenager. "Are you trying to _bribe_ a police officer, sir?" she asked in a serious tone.

"What?!" Brock screamed, as he jumped back, clearly startled by the implication, "Uhh… No! Or… well, not like that! Maybe? …Er… I'm not sure."

Misty facepalmed herself in the background. This was clearly not going well.

"Riiight…" Jenny nodded, "Maybe you three should go get some shelter in the local pokemon center."

Misty butted into the conversation again, waving her right hand in front of Brock to defend him. "He- He really didn't mean it like that." She said with a chuckle, "Brock just has a bad history with women."

Jenny still did not seem amused by the whole situation. She pulled a pokeball from her belt and released a growlithe.

"GROWLIIIITHE!" the pokemon cried.

"Aww! Sweet!" Ash exclaimed, as he pulled out his pokedex to analyze the creature.

Misty grabbed his hand before he could open the device up. "Ash, you have seen growlithe a million different times. Why would you need to point your pokedex at it?"

Ash shrugged a little bit. "I like to hear the updated information."

"Okay," Jenny remarked, "Growler here will show you three to the pokemon center, and I don't want to see anyone leaving it until this storm is over. Understand?"

The three teens nodded silently, any hope of getting to Pallet Town before Christmas morning completely gone.

The loyal fire-type led the trainers to the Viridian City pokemon center, a place that they were very familiar with (partially because that is were Ash and Misty first truly "met" one another, and partially because Pikachu had destroyed the roof there once). The place was decorated in red and green colors for the holidays. Christmas lights hung all around the ceiling, and there was a large, fully decorated tree in the right corner of the lobby. A mistletoe hung off to the left by the computers, and a complete cardboard cutout of Santa and his stantler stood near the door.

After admiring the scenery for a bit and settling into their rooms in the back, the trio decided to bide time by hanging out in the center's lobby and talking to people who came in. Unfortunately for them, it was Christmas Eve, and there was a snowstorm on its way. Nobody was coming in.

Ash had a better idea. Seeing how he had tried his hardest to get home by Christmas, the least he could do was phone his mom and tell her that he was not going to make it. He walked over to the PC to do just that, and after a few rings, his mom picked up.

"Hello?" came a high, cheery voice, as a brunette woman in her late thirties appeared on the computer monitor, "This is the Ketchum residence."

"Hi, mom!" Ash exclaimed with a smile and wave, "It's Ash! I'm at the Viridian City pokemon center!"

The woman's face lit up as soon as she saw her son. "Oh, sweetie, I'm so happy to see you! How are you doing? Are you okay? I heard there was a storm headed in your direction!"

"Uh.. yeah" the young man chuckled nervously, "Actually, that's what I called to tell you about."

Delia noticed that her son was visibly upset. So, she aimed to fix that. "Why the long face, honey?" she asked with a frown.

"Well…" he continued, "It's just… It looks like I'm not going to be able to see you tonight… or really much tomorrow if I can even leave by then."

The woman smiled at him. "Oh, don't fret, Ash! You've missed Christmas plenty of times since you've been off on your journey. I've grown to just accept it and save you a present for when you get home."

"Well, yeah," Ash replied, "But this year I feel like I was really close! I mean, I've got Misty and Brock here, and I'm only one town over. I guess I just really wish this storm hadn't gotten in the way. We could have had the first real Christmas in years!"

"Oh, Ash," His mother chuckled, "Even if you aren't home on time, every Christmas is a real Christmas when you are with someone you love! I'll just hold off on the stocking stuffing and cookie baking until tomorrow. We can have our real Christmas then."

Ash smiled at his mom. She was so sweet. Nothing ever seemed to get her down. "I guess." He sighed, "It just looses its authenticity a bit. Do you think we-"

The power went out.

"Oh! Great!" Misty shouted, "I was reading!"

"Nurse Joy, where did you go?" came Brock.

Ash looked around the room for a second. He could not see anything. It was pitch black. It must have been the storm.

He looked back at the blank computer screen his mom was on moments ago, and he smiled as the thought of fresh cooked, yet semi-late cookies filled his head. Yeah, a late Christmas would not be so bad. He just needed to make sure that they got home by tomorrow.

"Ash!" Misty cried, as she put her hand on the boy's shoulder, momentarily startling the trainer.

"Woah! Misty! How did you find me in the dark?"

"The computers are in a very distinct part of the center, Ash. I just walked over to where I remembered you sitting."

"Vee!" her little Eevee cried, reminding Ash that she was still carrying it.

"Right." He nodded. That made since, "We should find our way to another point of reference so we can know where we are."

"What about your pokemon?" Misty asked, "Don't you have a fire-type on you or something that can light up the area?"

"No. All my pokeballs are back in the room with my backpack." He explained.

"PikaPik!" Pikachu reminded.

"Yeah, only Pikachu is here." He confirmed.

"Well, at least that proves that this isn't Team Rocket." Misty sighed, "Does Pikachu know anything that can light up the room?"

"His attacks don't give off as much light as you would think. Trust me, I've tried."

"Hey, guys!" came Brock's voice, "Come down here!"

"Where are you?" Misty cried back.

"I'm sitting on the couch in the middle of the room!" he called back, "Get over here! You can use it as your point of reference!"

Misty grabbed onto Ash's hand, as Pikachu jumped on the trainer's shoulder, and together the three felt and listened their way over to where Brock was sitting. Once they came to the couch, everyone slumped into their seat.

"Okay, why did you want a point of reference now?" Brock asked his friend.

"You know," Ash shrugged, "Just to know where I am. I know where the rest of the center is relative to the couch, just like how Misty knew where I was relative to where she was sitting. Don't get me wrong, being stuck in a powerless pokemon center stinks, but being _lost_ in a powerless pokemon center is worse."

"I can agree with that." Brock admitted.

"Hey," Misty remembered, "Didn't this center used to have a pikachu generator?"

As if on cue, as soon as Misty said those words, the lights began to come on. The lights were dim, and they were few, but they were still on. They were illuminating a very small portion of the pokemon center and casting shadows on everything.

"Wow. Nice job, Mist!" Ash laughed, "That may be the first time that irony has saved people from freezing to death!"

"Is everybody okay?" came Nurse Joy's voice from behind the counter, "I'm sorry I left for a moment there, but I had to get our electric pokemon working on the generator! Nobody freaked out or ran into anything right?"

"No, ma'am. We're fine." Ash answered with a smile.

"Pika!" his pokemon added in.

"But why has so little of the power come back on?" Misty asked.

The nurse shrugged. "It's Christmas. I have fewer supplies in the back, because pokemon tend to take off for the holidays too."

"Seriously?" Brock asked in bewilderment.

"Seriously." Joy replied, "It's a holiday for everyone. Even I'm going to be headed home after this storm passes. My sister's Christmas is happening now so that she can come take over for me."

"Now, that's what I call compromising!" Misty cheered, "I wish my sisters worked together that well!"

"Wait. What about the computers?" Asked Ash, "I dropped a call earlier by accident. Can I call her back now?"

"I'm afraid not." Joy answered honestly, "We just don't have a lot of power, and I'm going to have to restrict electrical usage for the really important things like light, heat, and our life support for the few sick pokemon I have."

Ash slumped back down in the couch again. "Well, this stinks." He muttered, "I was beginning to get over the whole 'can't get home for Christmas' thing, and now this happens! This has got to be the most miserable Christmas Eve ever."

Misty covered her mouth and chuckled at that.

"Hey!" Ash sat back up, "What's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing." Misty defended, "Nothing."

"No." Ash was interested now, "No, seriously, tell me."

"I _am_ telling you, Ash. It's nothing."

"Eevee!" her pokemon chirped.

Ash looked at the normal-type for only a second. "Tell me or I'll feed Eevee toothpaste again."

"Ash! You wouldn't dare!"

"Alright you two!" Brock stepped in again, "You make me feel like a full-time parent. Misty, just tell Ash what you were laughing about."

"Fine." She conceded, "It's just… When you said that this was the most miserable Christmas Eve ever, my first thought was 'Clearly he has never had a Christmas with my sisters.'"

Ash and Brock were both looking at Misty with wide eyes now (well… as wide as Brock's got).

"Ouch." Ash remarked, "You think spending time with your sisters is worse than being trapped in a dark pokemon center with little to no electricity by a storm separating you from home?"

"Ash, in case you haven't gotten the idea yet, I don't really like my home."

"No. You've made it perfectly clear." Brock assured.

"Well, what _was_ your worst Christmas, Mist?" Ash asked with a bit of sarcasm.

"Well, first off," Misty began, "You've got to know that every year since my parents left, Daisy has thought that it was her job to make us cookies just like mom used to."

"Aaand how does that normally turn out?" Brock asked.

Misty's eyes narrowed on the boy, "Tell me, Brock, do I cook well?"

He and Ash exchanged glances for a moment, "I'll let ol' Ash here answer that one!" he decided, patting his friend on the back, "Go for it buddy!"

"Ummm..." Ash sweatdropped, "Well… once I think you made me some mashed potatoes for my birthday. That tasted alright."

Misty sighed. "Ash… that was supposed to be a cake."

The boy nearly fell over due to embarrassment. "Well… in retrospect, that makes a lot more sense."

Misty actually giggled at that. "It's okay, guys. I know I can't cook."

They both looked a lot calmer after she said that. Brock exhaled a bit, and Ash stopped sweating from her question.

"That's kind of the point." She said, "Daisy taught me how to cook."

"Ewww…" the boys moaned.

"Yeah. So, when I say that she took it upon herself to make us cookies every year, know that I mean every year I had to fear a meal legitimately _worse than fruitcake._"

The look of absolute horror across Ash and Brock's faces was hysterical.

"Okay," Brock admitted, "I now understand why you would rather be locked in a dark pokemon center all night. You might have just escaped one of the cruelest punishments imaginable."

"Wait!" Misty continued, "It gets worse."

Her traveling companions gulped at the thought.

"We also had a annual Christmas water show." She explained.

"Well, that doesn't seem so bad." Ash commented.

"And I was always the sea witch that wanted to unleash the mighty kyogre and destroy Christmas."

Ash changed his mind. "…That's messed up."

"Our last show was always on December 23rd," she continued, "So, that meant all day before Christmas Eve we had to clean the show set, pack all the props up, and wash out the pokemon tanks."

"Does that really take all day?" Brock asked.

"Imagine this." Misty deadpanned, "There were years that I would have to greet friends and relatives with seel droppings still smeared on my hands."

"Eww!" The boys shouted again, "Okay!" "TMI, Misty! TMI!"

Misty giggled from her seat, "Neither of you would ever last at my gym. You've gotta be tough. They don't call me the Tomboyish Mermaid for nothing!"

"…Who calls you that?" Ash asked.

Misty paused for a moment in shock. "It… It's a nickname I go by in Cerulean. You've seriously never heard anyone call me that?"

"Not even once."

"Yeah, well, that's cute and all, Misty," came Brock's sturdy voice, "But if anyone around here is well versed in bad Christmases, it's me."

His friends looked at him in awe. That's right! Before Ash and Misty met Brock, he had spent the last few years taking care of his nine younger brothers and sisters! Without a single parent home, with a family much bigger than Misty's, and with the huge age gap between Brock and his siblings, Christmas much have been a nightmare!

"That's right." Brock nodded again, "I've got a story for ya. Imagine this. It's December 4th. You're taking challenges at the gym to support your family. After a long day of work, you return home to find a few things broken. You know, Suzie ripped her dress again. Tommy and Timmy are fighting over a toy. It's nothing unusual. You take care of it and then go to make dinner. Everyone sits down at the table to eat after a _really_ long day. You're just waiting to get to go to the couch and relax for a bit, and then… _it happens_."

Ash and Misty just sat still, looking at Brock.

"Well?" he asked.

"Well, what?" Asked Misty.

"Yeah, I was getting excited." Said Ash, "Why all the build up?"

Brock facepalmed himself. "You're supposed to ask me _'What happens?'_" he explained.

"Oh!" the two realized simultaneously.

"What happens?" asked Ash.

"Forrest jumps out of his chair and asks '_When is Christmas?'_" he finished.

Ash and Misty just looked at each other, confused.

"How is that such a bad thing?" Misty asked.

Brock chuckled a little bit. "You two will see when you have kids."

This caused an odd exchange between Ash and Misty, as they both looked at each other for a moment. Ash made a gagging noise with his mouth, and Misty hit him on the head in response.

"He didn't mean it like that!" the girl shouted, "…Did you?"

Brock just started laughing louder. "No! I didn't mean it _anything_ like that, but if that's something you two are thinking about, please don't let me stop you!"

"Owww! Miiisty! That really hurt!" Ash complained.

"Pikachu!" his pokemon exclaimed to back him up.

"Oh, you'll get over it." Misty grunted, "Now, Brock, are you going to finish your story or what?"

"Right, right." The trained muttered, as he tried to calm himself down from the scene that had just unfolded.

He sat back up with his two companions re-situated and watching him closely.

"Okay," he continued, "You see, in a house full of nine kids under the age of ten, Christmas is a forbidden word. As soon as anyone says the word 'Christmas,' none of the kids will stop talking about it until Christmas Eve. Period."

"Oh, come on." Ash sighed, "It can't be that bad."

"Oh, it is." Brock reiterated, "In fact, it's worse than you think. I would get asked the question '_When is Christmas?_' twenty times a day from that moment onward."

"But there were only nine kids in the house." Misty reminded him.

"_IT DIDN'T MATTER!"_ Brock explained, "Every commercial that came on TV from that moment on became a present someone wanted for Christmas. Everything that appeared in a magazine until December 25th was immediately deemed a Christmas request. It was insane. I had to make sure that the Christmas tree and all of the decorations were put up _on the night_ that the first person mentioned Christmas, otherwise the kids would try to set all of them up before I came home from the gym the next day."

"Well, that actually sounds nice." Misty chimed in again, "I wish my sisters were more helpful with decorating the house."

"Well, what you're forgetting is that your sisters aren't underage kids with access to pokemon." Brock commented.

"Oh boy…" she responded.

"That's right!" Brock continued, "If I was _ever_ late in putting up the Christmas decorations, the kids would release all of the pokemon in the house to help them _'surprise'_ me when I came home."

Ash chuckled. "I bet you were surprised alright!"

Brock's eyes narrowed. "I once returned home to a giant hole in the back wall with Cindy stuck in a jar of mayonnaise."

"You mean… _her hand_ stuck in a jar of mayonnaise?" Misty asked.

"No." Brock corrected, "Her entire body was stuck in a giant jar of mayonnaise."

Ash thought about that one for a minute. "…How did she-"

"I don't know." Brock answered, "I stopped asking her years ago."

There was silence among the group, but it only lasted for a few seconds. As soon as Misty started laughing, everyone on the couch started burst into chuckles and howls. That was good.

"Your family is insane!" Ash said to Brock.

"Well, what about yours?" Misty asked.

"What _about_ mine?" he asked back.

"Everyone else has shared their horrible Christmas stories," Misty explained, "What about yours?"

Ash paused for a little bit. He didn't say a word. The smile disappeared from his face.

"I… Don't wanna talk about it." He tried.

"Aw, come on." Misty pressed, "It can't be much worse than Brock's."

"Vee!" Eevee agreed.

Even Pikachu was confused by this sudden turn of events. He jumped onto Ash's lap and looked him in the eyes.

"Pika?" the mouse asked his friend.

Ash sighed.

"Come on, Ash." Brock prodded, "How bad could it be?"

"Really bad." He answered, without even bothering to look at the boy, "And you guys better stop asking what happened on my worst Christmas… because if you keep asking… I'm gonna tell ya."

Ash felt a light warmth come over his left hand. His fingers had been comfortable in their gloves from the beginning, but now there was a new presence to the warmth. He looked up from the floor to see Misty's hand covering his. He looked up into her eyes, and she smiled back at him.

"We're here for you." She assured her friend, "Tell us."

Ash looked in his lap at his best friend.

"PikaPi!" the little creature chirped.

Ash looked back up to his human friends again. "Alright," he began, "You know what both of your stories had in common?"

"Ummm… Pokemon?" Misty guessed.

"Cooking?" Brock tried.

"People." Ash finally answered, "Misty, you have all of your sisters, and Brock, you have all of your siblings. All I've ever really had is my mom."

Brock and Misty let loose a sigh of relief after hearing that one.

"Ash, is that it?" Misty asked.

"We thought it was going to be something traumatizing!" Brock deadpanned.

"It was!" Ash shot back, "Guys, think about it! I never had any brothers or sisters! I was never any good at school! My mom was always busy! My only neighbor, Gary Oak, hated me for the longest time! I never had any friends until I met you two."

"You mean…" Misty started thinking, "I was the first friend you ever made?"

"Nope." Ash smiled.

"Pikachu!" his pokemon exclaimed.

"Oh, yeah." Misty sighed.

"But even you guys hated me at first." Ash continued, "Part of the reason I left home was that I knew no one would really miss me. The only person I was ever really friends with was my mom. She was also busy and low on money at the time. I was too much of a strain on her to stay at home."

"Ash…" Brock began.

"And Christmas was the same." He finished, "I was alone. I never really got any presents. I only had my mom."

"Well, wasn't that enough for you?" Brock asked again, "I mean, not to be rude or anything, but Christmas is about being thankful for what you have, right?"

"I was…" Ash began again, "But there was something else…"

His friends leaned in to hear what he was about to say.

"My dad left mid-December one year." He finally let out.

Nobody spoke.

"I've always… kind of had abandonment issues since then. That's why I love pokemon battling so much. We get to work as a team… together. I'm not alone."

Misty and Brock both put their hands on Ash's shoulders.

"You aren't alone now either." Misty commented.

Ash closed his eyes. What was it that his mom had said earlier? _Every Christmas is a real Christmas when you are with someone you love._

The young trainer smiled.

"Hey, Ash," Brock broke the silence, "Do you still have Blaziken in one of your pokeballs in the back?"

"Uh… Yeah." Ash nodded in response.

"Well, I just remembered I still have some chestnuts left in my backpack." He chuckled, as he pulled out a ziplock bag full of nuts, "Why don't you go get him and see if we can do a good ol' fashioned Christmas roast!"

"Oh! I'll get out the candy canes!" Misty cheered, as she opened her backpack as well.

Ash smiled, as he got up and walked to the back of the center. Best Christmas Eve ever!

* * *

**Okay, before you all start telling me "ASH DOEZN'T HAZ A BLAZIKEN! AND MISTY DOEZN'T HAZ AM EEVEE!" I just wanted to point out that our heroes are 16 in this fic and back in the Kanto region for some reason. Idk how/why he got a blaziken. I did not ask him. However, since this fic clearly takes place in the future, it is very likely that he got it between between the now and then.**


	3. M-Silver's First Christmas

**Okay, so this one was difficult to do because it was at the beginning of my ridiculously busy holiday weekend. I wrote it in a bit of a rush, but upon reading through it again, I really like. It's sweet, it's fun, and it has a Christmas-y moral and feeling. I think this story turned out really nice. Just goes to show that I sometimes underestimate myself. Anyway, Merry Christmas, Day 3!  
**

* * *

**Silver's First Christmas**

Mt. Silver was one of the mightiest rocky terrains in the entire pokemon world. The great hill stood in between the vast regions of Kanto and Johto, separating the two worlds with its presence. Some of the most powerful pokemon in either region found a way to take solace in the harsh conditions as many of the weaker pokemon either died out or migrated else ware. It was for this very reason that only the most powerful trainers were ever allowed access to the mountain.

However, on one particularly snowy Christmas afternoon, if one looked at the side of the mountain from just the right angle they could have sworn that they saw two children sledding down the slopes of the hill.

"WAHOOO!" Cried Gold at the top of his lungs, as he clasped the front of the sled even tighter through his red gloves. The naturally reckless dex holder was dressed in a heavy yellow jacket with a snowsuit underneath. His red scarf flapped in the wind as he pulled a pair of goggles from the top of his backwards yellow baseball cap to cover his eyes. "THIS IS SO AWESOME!" he screamed again, "Why didn't we think of this sooner?!"

His friend, Crystal, was holding onto his back even tighter than he held the sled, and as the cold graze of snow from beneath the two shot up against her blue coat, she only became more worried about the situation.

"HOW DID I LET YOU TALK ME INTO THIS?!" She shot back at him.

Gold only chuckled from the front. "Why don't you ask those dainty green gloves of yours?" he teased, "If this altitude doesn't stop me from breathing, your excessive squeezing might! How badly do want to hold onto me exactly?"

She blushed at that. "GOLD! If and when we make it off of this sled alive, I'm going to break your nose!"

"Hey! Try not to get _too_ handsy!" he continued to flirt.

Crystal would have came back at him with another threat or sarcastic remark, but her mind stopped for a moment when she leaned to the side and noticed that they were headed straight for a cliff.

"Gold!" she shouted again, "Watch where you're going! There's a cliff coming up!"

The boy just snorted at it with a testing smile. "Don't worry, I've got it handled." He assured, as he pulled his trusty pool stick out from underneath him.

"We are going to die!" Crystal emphasized, but then Gold shoved his pool stick out in front of the sled, deeply grinding it into the snow, and used it to push his weight off of. This effectively turned the trainers ninety degrees from the drop and put them right back on the path down the mountain.

Gold was howling with laughter and excitement at this point, and Crystal was just trying to catch her breath.

"_That_ was your plan for cliffs?!" Crystal nagged the boy, "What if the pool stick had broke? Or if it slipped out of your hands at that last moment?"

Gold shrugged his shoulders. "I guess we would have died." He admitted.

"Okay! That's it! I want off this thing now!" Crystal insisted, "And you are getting off too!"

"What?!" the boy asked in shock, as he turned around to better see his companion.

"That's right!" Crystal nodded, "This ends now! Before either of us die!"

"I don't know how to stop!" Gold defended.

Crystal was quiet for a moment. She had to let that one sink in. Was Gold really stupid enough to come up with a life threatening game, bring a friend along to play the game, and then never consider how to stop the game? She slapped herself in the face. Of course he was. He was Gold!

"ARE YOU CRAZY?!" She asked him.

Gold was still looking back at Crystal, "I guess so!" he laughed.

Crystal's eyes narrowed on her friend. "Okay, then, one more question." She began.

"Alright, shoot!"

"Do you know what to do if our speeding momentum just happens to hurdle us toward a big rock?"

"Umm…" Gold had to think on that one, "I… guess not… why?"

"Look in front of you." She deadpanned.

Gold turned around to find a huge rock, nearly the size of their sled, directly in their path and coming up fast. He sweatdropped.

"Now what, genius?" Crystal called from the back.

Gold didn't have time to answer. They hit the rock full force, launching both dex holders into the air and breaking the sled in half.

Crystal sat up from her rough landing with a face full of snow. She turned her neck a little bit to make sure it was not broken and then gasped when she saw that Gold was still lying on the ground, face down.

"Gold?!" she stuttered, as she struggled to stand up in all of the ice and snow.

No response. He did not even move.

"Gold!" she shouted again.

No response.

She ran over to her friend and knelt down in the snow again to try to turn him over.

"I swear Gold," she began to murmur as she lifted him, "you better not have died on me. If you aren't alive, I am going to kill you _again_ as soon as I die!"

Gold was now fully situated in her arms, and she held his face up to her's to see if he was still breathing. His tongue dropped out as she moved his head a little bit.

"GOLD!" She tried one more time.

His mouth closed, and a smile appeared on his face for a second. "May I recommend mouth-to-mouth?" he chuckled.

Crystal frowned at him. He was fine.

Gold began to laugh louder and louder. "Man! I really had you going for a second there, huh? You were seriously freaked out!"

Crystal punched him in the nose.

"OWW!" he screamed in pain, "What was that for?!"

"I toldja so." Crystal retorted with a smile, "Merry Christmas!"

"What are you two doing here?" came a still yet aggravated voice.

Both trainers looked toward the unknown bystander with a hint of curiosity and a hint of happiness. They both thought they recognized that tone.

Surely enough, just on the top of a nearby snowy hill there stood a young pokemon trainer about their age, dressed all in black, but ready for the winter. His long red hair hung down the side of his beanie, and at his side there stood a smirking weavile.

"SILVER!" the dex holders cried in unison.

"Should… I… come back at a better time?" he asked them.

The two trainers suddenly snapped back to reality and noticed that Crystal was still holding Gold in what would, under other circumstances, be considered a very suggestive position. Crystal fixed this problem by dropping the boy to the floor.

"Uh, no, no, now is fine." the girl chuckled, "We weren't really up to anything."

"Yeah right!" Gold shot back, as he made his way to his feet again, "Only if you consider sledding down the side of Mt. Silver to not be anything!"

"No." Silver replied, "I just consider it to be very stupid."

"Weavile!" his pokemon agreed.

"Well, excuse me," Gold bit back, "what exactly are you doing up here?"

"Training." Silver said with a shrug, "What else would someone come to Mt. Silver to do?"

Gold was just about to open his mouth again when Silver added, "And don't answer 'sledding,' because that idea was insane."

"Well, why training?" Crystal intervened again, "It's Christmas! Don't you think your pokemon deserve a break?"

Silver looked down at his weavile. The pokemon only smiled back up at him with a shake of his head.

"I think they're doing fine." Silver chuckled, "Besides, we've gotta step up our game! Word on the street is there's a tournament coming up!"

"Well, yeah, but what about _you_?" Crystal asked again, "Don't _you_ want to use Christmas to celebrate with the people you love?"

"Aww, Crys, I didn't know you cared!" Gold teased. Crystal ignored him.

"My dad is the head of an international evil organization, and my friends are limited to anyone that can tolerate me long enough to have a pokemon battle," Silver explained, "I don't really _do _Christmas. I don't have any loved ones."

"Umm… _hello!_" Gold teased, as she pulled Crystal in close to him and they both struck a goofy pose.

Silver laughed. "Look, don't get me wrong, Gold. We've come a long way since we met, and we are definitely friends, but I don't think I am quite close enough to you two to consider you _loved ones._"

"Well, let's see," Crystal chirped, as though she was about to make a list, "Are you happy when you see us?"

"Sometimes." He deadpanned.

"Are you willing to be kind when we make you mad?" Gold asked, slyly looking at Crystal.

"Or at least administer some _tough love_?" the girl added in, looking back at him.

"If I wasn't, Gold would already be dead." He replied.

"Alright. Two down." Crystal noted, "Are you willing to help us out even when you get absolutely nothing out of it?"

"No."

"We… we can concede that one." Gold decided, "Would you be willing to sacrifice an arm or a major bodily organ for us?"

"No!" Silver shouted in a disgusted tone.

Neither trainer knew how to respond to that one.

"Ouch." Crystal said, "Seriously?"

"I would donate a liver to you, Crys." Gold offered.

"I would donate to you too, Gold." She smiled back.

"Okay, guys!" Silver interjected again, "This is getting ridiculous. I need to get back to training. Merry Christmas or whatever." He walked back to the other side of the hill.

As the two dex holders saw him disappear, neither could take their eyes off of the footprints he left behind in the snow. He was truly having the loneliest Christmas possible.

"Well, that was depressing." Gold decided, as he walked back over to his broken sled in an attempt to gather and repair the pieces.

"It was more than depressing. It was heartbreaking." Crystal informed her friend, "I think we should do something."

"So do I." Replied Gold, as he turned a broken piece of sled over in his hand, "Do you think duct tape will work?"

"Not about that! I mean, we should do something about Silver!"

"What do you want to do?" Gold shrugged, "He's a grown boy. He said he didn't want to have a Christmas. So, he doesn't have to have one."

"But he doesn't know what he's missing out on!" Crystal continued, as she stumbled her way over to where Gold was standing, "Silver never _did_ have the best home life, but that doesn't mean that things have to continue that way. He's got us now."

Gold faced his friend and put his hands on his hips. "He wouldn't even give you a liver!" he reminded.

"Oh, that's just Silver!" she defended, "He doesn't like to mention how much he actually cares about people, because he thinks it makes him look weak. He's just too embarrassed."

"Look," Gold sighed, "I like Silver. Seriously, I do, but we're up on a mountain by ourselves right now, our seniors are nowhere near us, and we've got no money. What do you expect us to do, throw him a Christmas party?"

Crystal smiled. "I know! We can get him a gift!"

"Again." Gold stressed, "How?"

She pondered that one for a moment. "We could make him something!"

"Hardly." Gold chuckled, "We both have the creativity of a metapod."

Gold was right. Crystal had to think of something else. She closed her eyes and turned around. It had to be something good. It had to be something amazing. It had to be something so great that even Silver could not help but smile at the thought.

She opened her eyes, and in the very first second she saw a larvitar dash into a nearby cave. Didn't Silver have one of those before? Wait! No! Lance had _loaned_ _him_ _a tyranitar_ before, and, more importantly, he had _loved_ using the thing. Crystal smiled.

Gold saw it all unfold. He saw the little pokemon dash into the cave. He saw Crystal think for a few seconds. He saw that devilish (if not somewhat attractive) smile on her face. "Oh no!" he said, shaking his head, "I know how rare those are! We are not going to spend the rest of our Christmas up on this mountain, trying to find another one of those!"

Crystal turned to Gold with the same mischievous grin, "We just have to track down that one." She explained, "And you don't have any choice."

Gold began to back away from her. He did not like the looks of this. She was freaking him out, but one thing was for sure, he _was not_ going to chase after that larvitar.

* * *

A few hours later, Gold was standing right outside the same cave that Crystal had seen earlier. He flipped open his pokegear.

"How did I let you talk me into this?" he moaned.

"Oh, quit whining." Crystal said from the other end, "Are you in position?"

"Yeah, I guess so," he answered, "But this is a cave, Crys. Who knows how many pokemon could be hiding in it? I'm not sure if we are going to get exactly what we're looking for."

"Gold," she answered back in a mom voice, "Whose special skill is capturing?"

"Well, you somehow got me to stay here, didn't you?"

"Alright, just release your pokemon when I tell you to." She said.

Meanwhile, Crystal had positioned herself on the other side of the small cave, right outside the exit. She had pulled a bunch of different branches off of a nearby tree, and fashioned them into an artificial bush that sat right next to the cave's entrance.

The girl ducked down into the branches until she could not be seen, and she whispered into the pokegear, "Okay, go."

And with that signal, Gold released every pokemon he had with him at the moment and ordered all of them to attack the cave walls as brutally as possible. The chaos echoed throughout the small cavern and caused many of the pokemon inside to freak out.

Zubats and golbats and gravelers and donphans began to go crazy inside of the cave, and in all the panic, most of the pokemon rushed outside into the snow, a virtual stampede resulting from the disturbance. Of course, none of the pokemon would run _toward_ the outsiders that were making all of the noise. So, they naturally ran out the other exit to the cave, the exit Crystal was waiting at.

As the girl peeked through the vines and leaves that made up her fake bush, she noticed each pokemon running out of the cave. She looked at them each separately and as one, just waiting until she saw that one little… there it is!

Crystal jumped out of the leaves as soon as she saw the larvitar appear in the stampede.

"Ah ha!" she shouted with confidence, as she kicked a pokeball in the little ground-type's direction, "Gotcha!"

The pokeball hit the little creature spot on, and it engulfed the pokemon in a red beam, closing the ball to see if the capture would hold.

The ball shook a few times and then stopped. Lartivar was caught.

"Yes!" Crystal cried with victory, as she walked over to pick up Silver's new pokemon, "That was too easy."

She was right. Right before she got to the pokeball, a parasect ran out of the cave and bumped into the orb, sending it rolling down a hill.

"Ah! Wait!" she cried again, reaching her hand out as if she could grab the ball from where she was standing. She ran after the device, jogging down the snowy slope as fast as she could.

"So, how did it go?" came Gold's voice again from her pokegear.

"I completely failed to realize that causing a stampede might have adverse side effects on my capture!" she explained, still running toward the increasingly fast pokeball.

"Meaning?"

"I'm chasing a pokeball down a hill like an idiot." She said bluntly.

"Can you catch it?" he asked.

"Probably not. It's continuing to speed up due to the increase in slope and momentum. I doubt I can run fast enough to-"

"Wrong answer!" Gold yelled, as he jumped out from behind Crystal in his sled.

The trainer swooped down the snowy hill and scooped Crystal up on the way, sitting her right behind him.

Crystal laughed, as she wrapped her arms around her friend again to stay onboard, "Gold, how did you fix this thing?"

"Sunbo learned vine whip the other day," Gold explained, referencing his trusty sunflora, "It seemed like a shame not to use it."

"Alright!" Crystal cheered, "Now, all we have to do is catch that pokeball!"

The sled continued to gain speed as the steepness increased. It went faster and faster, the pokeball right in front of it. Ironically, the two passed Silver and Weavile on their way down the mountain.

"I think we are going to catch it!" Gold added with confidence. They were gaining on the ball.

They went up one hill, and then down the same. Up one hill, and down the same. Up one hill… and there was no down.

"WOAH!" the two trainers screamed, as they and their sled went off of a slope and into the air. There was nothing beneath them. That was the end of the mountain. They had just gone off of a cliff. The sled flew out from beneath them.

"Gold! Do something!" Crystal yelled desperately, and Gold pulled out his pool stick, as usual, sticking the end of it into the very last piece of land within reaching distance. It stuck into the side of the mountain, just barely keeping the boy from death. In mid-fall, Crystal also managed to grab a hold of Gold's leg, leaving the two hanging there off the edge of a cliff on Mt. Silver.

"Whew… Well, that was close." Gold sighed.

"It still is close, Gold!" Crystal cried from beneath him, "We are going to die if we don't do something!"

"Don't worry." He said calmly, "I'll just reach into my pocket and get out my togekiss, Togebo. He can fly us out of here."

But as soon as Gold moved his hand, the pool stick shifted, snow falling off of the cliff.

"Gold…." Crystal began again, "Do not move…"

The stick shifted again. It was going to come loose.

"I… can't…" he tried, right before the pool stick fell out of the snow. The two dex holders began to fall to their doom.

But then something caught Gold. Something caught him at the last second before he fell, and as he looked up, he saw Silver, leaning over the edge of the mountain with Gold's pool stick firmly grasped in his hand.

"Gold…" Silver grunted, "I can't hold onto this thing forever… You guys are going to pull me down too… Get out your flying-type…"

At a loss for words, the boy only nodded to his friend's suggestion, and in just a few seconds, Togebo was released, and the large pokemon lifted his friends back onto the top of the mountain.

Once the panic was over, the three dex holders took a few minutes to recooperate. Nobody really spoke. They just sat in the snow panting.

Silver finally broke the silence.

"What was that all about?" he asked, "Did you idiots really just sled off of the mountain?"

"We… We were trying to get you a pokemon…" Gold explained, "It was Crystal's stupid idea so that you would have a good Christmas..."

Silver looked at Crystal with a perplexed glance.

"Just for the record," she chuckled, as she produced a small, snow covered pokeball and tossed it to her friend, "Merry Christmas."

Silver looked at the ball now with that same perplexed glance. He saw the lartivar inside, staring back at him. "Well… thanks…." He began, "But you didn't have to risk your lives for it…"

Gold began to laugh loudly.

"Hey! What's the big idea?!" Silver grunted, "Seriously! You two could have died!"

"You lied to us!" the boy chocked out, "You totally lied to us!"

"What?" Crystal asked, trying to keep up.

"Okay, you said you wouldn't sacrifice an arm for us earlier, remember?" Gold chuckled.

"Yeah." He admitted.

"Well, you just nearly sacrificed your life for us!" Gold explained.

Silver blushed a little bit.

"Yeah…" began Crystal, "and you also told us you wouldn't do something nice for us for nothing in return, but what did you get out of this?"

Silver smiled at that one. "Well, I guess you guys proved me wrong." He admitted, shoving his new pokemon in his pocket, "Now, let's go home."

"Hot chocolate?" Gold asked.

"You know it." He replied, putting his arms around his two friends, "Merry Christmas, guys."


	4. A-The Lost Latias

**So, it's 12:08AM! I'm a little late for this one. XD Oh well, I did my best. In case you didn't realize by my lack of updates, this weekend has been very busy for me. That's how the holidays work, ya know? Oh well... Since Saturday did not get an update, I'm just going to extend my deadline to December 24th, Christmas Eve. It feels more right that way, anyway. No skin off my nose. I really liked how this chapter came out. It is probably my favorite so far. It is also the longest. I hope you enjoy it too! Merry Christmas, day 4!**

* * *

**The Lost Latias**

"Do you think he's anywhere near the clearing?"

"I don't know, but pretty soon the blizzard is gonna be too harsh to find him anywhere else."

The two teens wandered through one of the many thick forests of Johto, fighting back the mounds of snow that the sky was apparently determined to drop on them. Neither trainer was dressed to be out in a blizzard this harsh, but then again, neither trainer expected to leave the safety of the pokemon center this late on Christmas Eve.

The boy was in the lead, and he tried to use his body the best he could to block the girl from becoming covered in snow, but it was truly the girl's houndour that the two were following. The pokemon's flamethrower attack was doing a decent job of melting the snow in front of the two so that they could travel easier, and her nose was being used to track the sent of the duo's long lost friend, the reason they had taken it upon themselves to brave such terrible conditions.

The girl wore a fluffy white jacket with matching boots and beanie to protect her small body and sky blue hair from the cold. The outfit was practical and beautiful, a type of fashion she tended to fancy, but it was nothing compared to the ferocity of a Johto blizzard. Marina shivered with each step.

The boy was wearing a large blue coat with a black snowsuit underneath. Atop his brown hair was a pulled up hood from said coat, earmuffs underneath. Unlike the girl's outfit, this suit was designed specifically for survival… but not in a storm like this. In this storm, Vincent just stumbled around in the freezing snow due to his heavy clothes and oversized boots.

It is safe to say that neither traveler was enjoying this trek.

After a few more minutes in pure misery, the houndour took her nose away from the trail with a small whimper and a frown beginning to take shape on her face. She stood still.

"Wh-What's wrong, Hottie?" Vincent asked the dog.

She whimpered a little in response and walked back to her master, head bent in shame.

Marina nearly cried at the sight. "You… you lost his trail, didn't you?"

Hottie nodded slowly.

Nobody spoke for a while. Marina nodded her head in return.

"I understand… You did your best." She reminded the pokemon. Hottie could not bear to look up from the snow. So, Marina just returned her houndour to her pokeball without saying anything else.

Vincent did not look like he was taking this well. He kicked the snow at the floor and scoffed loudly.

"I don't understand!" the boy cried out, "Jimmy told us that he would meet us at the pokemon center! He never shows up, so now we are out here in the woods looking for him at 10:00 at night in the middle of one of the worst blizzards our region has ever gone through!"

He slumped to the floor with an elongated sigh, and then proceeded to look up at his friend. "It's been hours. Are we still looking for Jimmy or just his body?"

Marina gasped at the thought. "Don't… don't you even say that, Vincent! He's got to be out here somewhere. Jimmy is too stubborn to just freeze to death!"

The boy looked up into the stars, despite the major amounts of hail, and for a brief moment, he saw a bright twinkle in the night sky. "Hey…" he remarked in surprise, "What is that?"

Marina covered her face and looked in the air too, but she did not see a twinkle. Instead, she noticed a huge pillar of fire rising in the distance, as though it was shot up into the starry night. Only after the full effect had worn off did the flames leave behind the same twinkle that Vincent had seen.

"That… that's gotta be him!" the girl decided, "That's gotta be Jimmy and his typhlosion!" She pulled Vincent off of the floor and took off in the direction of the twinkle, never bothering to let go of her friend's arm. He nearly fell down again over five times as they raced to what was hopefully their friend.

* * *

The duo happened to be in luck, because not far from where they were running, a young boy in a red jacket and baggy blue pants sat in a small cave up against a large red pokemon, yellow cap turned backwards as always so that his ridiculously large black hair could droop from his head in just the way he preferred.

Jimmy shivered from where he sat. Despite the fact that the young trainer was clearly out of the weather and his arms were wrapped around his torso, he was not dressed for this.

His typhlosion stood at the very boundary of the cave's entrance at the base of the tiny hill on his hind legs. The pokemon stuck its head out from underneath the shelter in a periodic fashion to shoot fire into the air. He was hoping someone would see the signal. Someone nearby. Soon.

"D-d-d-don't w-worry, Latias…" Jimmy muttered, as he patted the pokemon behind him on the back, "W-we-'ll get you ou-out of here in n-n-no time…"

The great legendary that lay behind the boy moaned in pain as sweat dripped from her face. Latias was seriously hurt, and she could not stand the cold much longer. Jimmy's heavy yellow coat sat on the pokemon's side to keep it warm, and Jimmy himself was still pressed up against her in hopes that the body heat would do the pokemon good. It grunted and squealed lightly again.

"D-don't wor-rry…" Jimmy softly reminded her, his voice getting weaker, "We're… g-gonna… be…" he lost consciousness.

* * *

"Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!" Cried the trio of misfits as they flew through the cold winter air.

Jessie, James, and Meowth were three agents in an evil organization known as Team Rocket, and they had just been sent "blasting off" yet again in another humiliating defeat by _three troublesome little twerps_.

"I told you that being crooked on Christmas Eve was bad karma!" James yelled at his redheaded companion.

"What- ow!- are you- ow!- talking about, James? Those twerps send us blasting- ow!- off all the time!"

"Yeah!" added Meowth, "Ow! But how many- ow!- times are we sent blasting off into- ow!- a blizzard?!"

"That's not even- ow!- what I was talking about- ow!" James returned, "This time- ow!- we never even got our- ow!- disguises off!"

Sure enough, the three criminals were dressed in full-fledged hiking gear. They meant to pose as travelers in their most recent scheme to steal the twerp's pikachu. They each had on heavy brown coats, pants, backpacks, and hats with a matching theme of khaki coloring.

"Ok! I'll give you- ow!- that one!" Jessie conceded, "They almost- ow!- always fall for our- ow!- brilliant disguises!"

"Hey! What's that?" James asked, pointing ahead in their trajectory, where a large pillar of flames rose into the sky.

"Well, whatevah it is we're about ta hit it!" Meowth screamed, the rest of the trio following him, while they flew into the searing fire and crashed into the small hill below it.

"Urgh…" James moaned, "This is the worst Christmas Eve I've had in years…"

"Really?" Jessie perked up, "What was your _worst_ Christmas Eve?"

"Oh! Well, I'll tell you mine, if you tell me yours!"

"We don't have time for this!" Meowth yelled, scratching both rockets in their faces, "Get yer act tagether, guys! We've gotta find some sheltah before we freeze ta death!"

James shook the scratches off and leaned into the snow-covered hill they were sitting on, putting his head firmly against the ground.

His two companions responded by just staring at him for a moment, not really sure what to make out of this random action, but with hail raining down on their heads and a ridiculous chill running through their clothes, neither was very patient.

"James! What on earth are you doing?" Jessie finally demanded, and the boy responded by shoving his hand at her to say 'stop.'

Another pillar of fire shot to the air from the bottom of the hill, causing all three rockets to jump back in shock.

"James!" Jessie screamed, while grabbing him by the shirt, "What did you do?!"

"They wasn't me!" the rocket swore, waving his hands in front of his face, "I was just investigating a noise I heard! It sounds like voices are coming from inside the hill!"

"Voices?" Meowth asked, "Could dat mean…"

"We're not alone?" Jessie finished.

The three rockets became quiet and scooted to the edge of the hilltop to look off of the side. The first thing they saw was two heavily dressed children running out of the woods and over to the hill in a panic.

* * *

"That's definitely him!" Marina shouted, as she ground to a stop in front of Typhlosion, Vincent still locked in her right arm.

"TYPHLOSION!" the girl cried in joy, leaning over to hug the big pokemon.

"Ty-Ty-Phlosion." He grunted back in return.

Vincent was dizzy. He spun around on one foot, before (intentionally or otherwise) bowing to the fire-type. "Heeey, there, buddy! How's it goin'?"

Marina jumped up from her hug in a second. "Where's Jimmy?"

Typhlosion dropped to all four feet and led his friends over to the trainer in question.

The duo gasped at what they saw. Their friend, Jimmy, was dressed in his usual clothes, unconscious, backed up against a rare legendary pokemon. Nobody was moving. Jimmy did talk a little bit in his sleep, and latias moaned every once in a while, but no one was moving.

The idea that they were in the room with a latias would have been much cooler under different conditions, but Marina screamed at the top of her lungs when she realized the state Jimmy was in.

"JIMMY!" she squealed, running over to the boy as fast as she could. She pulled her right glove off with her teeth and placed her skin against Jimmy's head. It was freezing. "Vincent, get over here now! If we don't wake Jimmy up, he's going to die!"

Vincent ran over to his friends and knelt down toward the boy. "What do we do?" he asked.

"Just… um…" Marina pulled her jacket off over her head and put it over Jimmy's torso like a sheet, "I need you to hug him!"

"Hug him?"

"Yes!" she nodded ferociously, "Just hug him now! He needs the warmth!"

The girl turned back around to Typhlosion. "Where is his winter coat?!" she demanded.

"Ty! Ty!" he responded, motioning to the top of the latias.

"Laaa…." The pitiful pokemon whined.

Marina frowned at that. Latias' natural coat should have been able to keep the pokemon warm on its own. She didn't understand why Jimmy would sacrifice his own warmth for the creature.

"Laaa…." The pokemon whined again.

Well, whatever the case, something was definitely wrong with that poor thing. Marina would have to think of something else.

…She hit herself in the forehead. They were standing in the room with a FIRE-TYPE pokemon!

"Typhlosion! Do you think you could heat Jimmy up a little bit with a small fire attack?"

"Phlo." He nodded his head.

Marina walked over to her sleeping friend and pulled Vincent off of the boy.

"What?" Vincent asked in surprise, "Am… am I done? Is that all I need to do?"

She didn't respond. She just pulled him out of the line of fire, before screaming, "Now!"

And Typhlosion let loose a stream of fire that ran under his trainer's butt and heated the boy up quick. He still didn't move.

"Come on…" Marina muttered, as the fire kept on coming. "Come on…"

"Urg…" the trainer murmured, as he stirred in his sleep, "Urgh… huh… YOOOOWCH!"

Jimmy shot up from his position, throwing Marina's jacket off and screaming, with his pants on fire and his entire body burning. He ran around the cave in pain, eventually diving his bottom into the snow outside to cool his pants.

"Ouch! Typhlosion! Why did you-"

"JIMMY!" Marina cheered, as she tackled the boy over and into the snow, "Oh my gosh! We were so worried about you!"

"M-Marina?! What are you doing here?" he blushed.

Vincent stumbled over to his friend as well, shoving the two off of each other. "We came looking for you when you never showed up at the pokemon center." He explained, "We've been gone so long that we probably have a search party _looking for us_ now."

Marina stood up from the snow and pulled Jimmy with her. "Don't you ever do that again!" she warned, "What were you thinking, staying out here in a blizzard without a good coat? If we hadn't gotten here when we did, you might be dead!"

Jimmy turned to the latias still lying in the cave behind Typhlosion. His friends joined him in just a few seconds.

"…How long has it been here?" Marina asked.

"I don't know."

"Why isn't it in the Hoenn region?" Vincent added.

"I don't know."

Marina looked at her friend with a suspicious glare. "Well, what do you know?"

Jimmy shrugged. "I was walking over to the pokemon center to meet you guys for Christmas Eve tonight, -obviously _WAY_ before this blizzard started- when Typhlosion and I saw a glittering light in the sky. We decided to go and investigate, and when we got to this hill, that latias was sitting inside, moaning in pain. I'm guessing what we saw in the sky was a dragon pulse attack. She was signaling for help."

He looked at both of his friends with a sympathetic frown. "I'm pretty sure that she's sick, but we're out of pokegear range. I couldn't get in contact with any of the pokemon centers."

"Why not just capture it?" Vincent asked, "You can bring it to the pokemon center in a pokeball."

Jimmy pulled his pockets inside out. "I'm all out. You guys?"

Both kids shrugged and pulled their pockets inside out too.

"I thought about going back to town to get some supplies or some people to help her, but I also remembered hearing about the blizzard that was expected tonight. The snow had already started. I knew that I would never make it back in time. My only option was to stay here and help her."

"Or to go back on your own!" Marina reminded him, "You didn't have to stay here and protect her! You should have been protecting yourself!"

"She would never have survived this long if I wasn't here!" Jimmy bit back, "Whatever is wrong with her has given her the chills, and coupled with this weather, she needs someone to help her."

Vincent and Marina nodded. They were not going to argue with that.

"Well, what do we do now?" Marina asked.

Jimmy put the girl's jacket back on her, and he backed up against the latias again. "We wait until the storm clears so we can go get some help… either that or we pray for a miracle."

"Laaa…" the pokemon cried again.

With nothing else to do, the three trainers and Typhlosion, backed up against the legendary pokemon to keep it warm. None of them were aware that right on top of the hill, three Team Rocket agents had heard the whole thing.

* * *

"D… did you hear that, James?" Jessie begged her companion.

"I did, Jessie! I did! It looks like Christmas _did_ come this year!"

"Well, we've still got an hour and a half left, but close enough." Meowth agreed.

"If we can find a way to get that legendary pokemon out of that cave and over to the boss before those twerps can find any help, we'll be golden!" the girl rocket came again.

"Who needs a Christmas bonus?" Meowth added, "All we gotta do is find a place ta take the pokemon so we can treat it! After we're done, we'll send it straight to da boss!"

"Wait a minute…" James interrupted, "I think I just remembered something…"

"What's that?" asked Jessie.

"A few days ago, I remember hearing about a plan to capture a latias made by some of our higher ups."

"Really?"

"Yes." James nodded, "In fact… If memory serves correct, the plan ended with the pokemon being hand delivered straight to Team Rocket HQ."

"You mean in Kanto?" Meowth confirmed.

James nodded again. "Provided that the latias in question was originally in Hoenn, as most latias are, that would put the ship carrying the pokemon…"

"In a direct route over Johto!" Jessie finished.

"Wait a minute!" Meowth interrupted again, "Your tellin' me dat you think some latias Team Rocket was supposed ta capture several days ago, managed to escape in da middle of transportation and ended up here?"

The trio smiled, before jumping together in a hug. "WE'RE GOING TO BE EVEN RICHER THAN WE THOUGHT WE WOULD BE FIVE MINUTES AGO!"

Jessie shoved her way out of the embrace first. "Wait. Even if we can get that latias out underneath those brats' hairs, where are we going to bring it?"

Meowth pulled a map out of the hiking backpack that he was still wearing. "Der's a Team Rocket safe house on route 34, not far from here. We can bring da pokemon there, figure out what's wrong wit it, and den bring it to da boss when it's all fixed up."

"We just need a way to bring it over there…" James mused.

Jessie had a sparkle in her eye, as she let out an evil smirk. "Do you boys remember where the balloon crashed?"

* * *

Jimmy, Vincent, Marina, and Typhlosion were all bundled together on the latias. Somehow, the combined body heat still didn't purge the chill from the cold outside.

"W-we can't stay here forever…" Vincent muttered, "There's n-no way we'll make it until the blizzard stops…"

Jimmy's eyes narrowed in pure determination. "Then we'll die here."

"J-Jimmy…" Marina began, "I un-understand that we h-h-have to help this latias, but I don't want this to be the last Christmas Eve we sp-spend together… Vincent d-does have a point. We would last b-b-b-etter going back to the town then we would staying here."

Jimmy did not respond. He was thinking about it. He didn't want to die, and he certainly didn't want his friends to die. But this was a latias. This was a legend. He couldn't… No… He could… For his friends…

"Alright…" he finally decided, "I guess you guys are-"

"Hello in there!" came a shout from outside. A young hiker with purple hair entered the cave carrying a large green basket behind him. "Does anybody in here need rescuing?"

Vincent shot up from his seat at first sight of the man. "Oh! Thank goodness!" he cried, "You must be the search party that was sent for us!"

"…What's with the giant basket?" Jimmy asked.

"Um… er… Yes! I am from your search party!" the man admitted, "You can call me James, and this giant basket… uh… I just brought it along in case there were any giant pokemon that needed saving!"

"Wow… What a lucky brake." Marina said.

"We're always prepared!" came another voice, as a lady hiker with long red hair stumbled into the cave, carrying what appeared to be a giant, deflated meowth balloon.

"Well, who the heck are you?" Jimmy asked again.

"Uh… My name is Jessie!" the lady chirped, "And I brought this giant balloon to… uh… help transport any giant pokemon."

"Okaaaay…" Vincent raised his eyebrow in suspicion.

"And I'm Meowth!" another voice rang, as a meowth entered, fully dressed in hiking gear with a huge coil of rope at his side, "Now, wadaya say we help you little twerps- I mean kids- get yer giant pokemon somewhere safer den dis?"

The three trainers looked at each other curiously and then looked back at the trio of hikers that had found their way to the cave. None of them were quite sure what to think of the situation, but Jimmy _had_ said they needed a miracle before. Beggars can't be choosers.

* * *

Several minutes later, the trainers and hikers were zipping through the blizzard to route 34, where the hikers swore their safe house was located. Latias was sitting in the giant basket with Jessie, James, and Moewth, who covered the pokemon up with a ripped part of the meowth balloon, to block it from snow and hail. Another portion of the meowth balloon was tied tightly to the front of the basket with rope to create a makeshift sail for the contraption. Jimmy, Vincent, and Miranda had kindly volunteered to have their pokemon shoot water, fire, wind, or whatever they could find at the sail, allowing it to brisk the basket through the forest.

"This is working perfectly!" Miranda cheered.

"We're really lucky you guys came along!" Vincent thanked the hikers.

Jessie, James, and Meowth smiled at the kid from the back.

"No problem!" Jessie assured, "We're happy to help!"

Jimmy looked at latias from where he was standing. The pokemon was still crying. In fact, it seemed more stressed than ever. "Don't worry, buddy, we'll make sure you're okay."

All of the sudden, the basket came to a stop, prompting Team Rocket to look in the front and see what was happening. Vincent had gotten out of the basket and was making his way over to a small house near the stopping point.

"Hey, what gives?" Meowth asked, "This aint the safe house."

"No," Miranda confirmed, "That's the Johto Day Care Center. We were pretty lucky to come across it, huh? Now you three don't have to take care of Latias after all."

"What?!" they all screamed in unison.

"No, no, no!" James cried, "You can't leave the latias here! You just can't!"

"Why not?" asked Jimmy, just as Vincent returned to the basket.

"Sorry. The Day Care man said that they were full due to the blizzard." He explained, "There's no room…"

"Be…cause there is no room there!" James finished.

"Yeah!" Jessie smiled, "Don't you think we would do our research before rescuing pokemon?"

"Oh…" Jimmy shrugged, "Alright. Sorry for doubting you guys."

"Yeah, you should trust us more often." Meowth chuckled.

The party went back on the road. They went down route 34 for only a few minutes more before arriving at the safe house, and everyone was instantly refreshed upon entering. The house was warm, and it had electricity… That was about it. Other than that, the house was pretty much a dump. There was metal lying all around the place. The rooms had no decorations. The roof was almost shack like. Parts of it looked like one big construction project, but it had heat, and that was good enough.

Everyone worked together to shove the latias and her basket into the building.

"Okay…" Jimmy huffed, having finally slumped down to take a break, "What do we do now?"

"Are you three trained to handle injured pokemon?" Marina asked the hikers.

"Oh… of course!" Jessie assured, "Just give us a second to talk amongst ourselves!" She grabbed her two partners and walked them into another room.

"Okay!" she let out, "Now, what do we do?"

Meowth walked over to a small control panel in the room and presented it to the gang. "Alright, dis here is standard issue stuff! You all saw da metal junk lyin' around in da other room, right?"

Jessie and James both nodded.

"Well…" Meowth motioned to the controls, "It wasn't really junk! Ya see, each lever activates a trap. With da flick of a switch we can have all tree of dos twerps and dat latias captured!"

"But that latias might know some pretty powerful attacks." Jessie reminded.

"And the regular twerps _always_ manage to break out of our traps." James added.

Meowth simply shook his head. "It doesn't matter. Der are _a ton_ of traps on dis panel. Sure, maybe dey can escape one, but two? Tree? Fifteen? Now dat dey're in our safe house, we've got 'em."

Just then, a huge crash came from the other room, complete with an "Aw! Awesome!" from Jimmy.

They rockets ran back into the room to see what happened. They were twice as shocked as before. In the room, next to the sick latias, was a perfectly healthy latios.

"Jessie! James! Meowth!" Marina called, "Come look at this! A latios just busted into the room to see its sister!"

The trio walked over to the pair with their jaws still on the floor.

"It's amazing!" Vincent noted.

James leaned over to Jessie slowly and whispered, "We are sooooo rich!"

"Laaaa…." The latias continued to whine.

The latios moved closer to its sister and rubbed against her neck.

That was when Jimmy got a brilliant idea. "Hey! Meowth!"

"Uhh… What's up?" the feline asked, as he snapped out of his daze.

"You can speak human. Why don't you find out what's wrong with Latias for us?"

Everyone in the room looked at Jimmy in awe. Why hadn't anybody thought of that yet?

Meowth simply shrugged his shoulders and went over to talk to the legendary. The conversation went on for about ten minutes, Meowth beginning to blush about half way through. Surprisingly, Latias sounded more happy than sad throughout the discussion.

"Well, what did it say?" Vincent asked at the end.

"Uh… hehe…" Meowth chuckled, pointing at the latios, "Dat aint her brother."

"Huh? Then what's up?" asked James.

"…She's about to lay an egg."

That shocked everybody. In fact, out of all of the strange things that had happened that night, that was the weirdest. Apparently, latias was going through something quite similar to what human mothers go through before giving birth. She was sick and weak because she was about to lay an egg, and as the Johto trainers and Team Rocket helped her lay her egg that night, everybody in the safe house got to experience the touching feeling of having helped a pokemon in need with no real reason.

After all was said and done, the six friends stood back from the new happy family, watching the latios and latias snuggle together with their new egg that would surely hatch into a wonderful legendary.

Miranda checked her pokegear. "Hey, everybody, I just now noticed, but it's officially 12:03! Merry Christmas!"

Jimmy continued to look at the latios family with a smile on his face. "Hey…" he began, "An egg laid on Christmas?"

Vincent perked up. "We were led to them by a twinkle in the sky…"

"No room at the Day Care Center…" Miranda mumbled, "The egg was laid in an old safe house…"

They turned to face Team Rocket, and Jimmy laughed a little, "I take it you three were the wise men?"

The thieves didn't really know how to respond to that. "You... think we're wise?"

"Well, sure." Marina complimented.

"If you three hadn't shown up with your balloon parts and crazy plan, we might have died back there." Vincent reminded them.

James ran up to the three kids and gave them a group hug. "Thank you so much, you little twerps! I don't know if we just broke the fourth wall or something, but it is _SO touching_ that we were able to make this family happen!"

"Agreed!" Jimmy said, adding in a thumbs up.

Jessie looked at Meowth. "I was thinking…"

"Maybe da boss has enough pokemon?" he finished.

Jessie smiled at him.

"We were so close dis time." he sighed, "There is no way day could escape, ya know?"

"Come on, don't be a scrooge." She said with a chuckle, "We'll go back to being bad after the holidays."

* * *

**Well, there you have it! I hope nobody had any issues with Jimmy, Vincent, and Miranda playing the main roles this time. It is hard to do a Johto story for the anime without using Ash, Misty, and Brock again, but I don't wanna do the same thing twice! I'm being difficult! I added in Team Rocket in case anyone was unfamiliar with the Johto heroes. I also really love it when something turns Team Rocket good, even if it is momentarily. It just shows how moving the situation is. Team Rocket had it this time. They _had it!_ I'm trying to emphasize that the traps would have worked. Had Team Rocket not decided against it, they could have finally been the winners, but they put someone else first, and isn't that what Christmas is about? Putting others before yourself? Giving? I think so, and that makes this story my favorite so far.**


	5. M-Christmas Sweets

**So, this is technically my second submission of the day because I was late yesterday, but whatever. I'm glad you are all liking my stories. And now I present to you three of the most anticipated characters thus far in any of my fics. Please tell me if I am writing them well before they show up in _Pokemon Adventures: AshGray Chapter_. I want to portray these three as accurately as I can. People who dislike Franticshipping, beware. Merry Christmas, everybody! Day 5!**

* * *

**Christmas Sweets  
**

Emerald's gaze darted up into the semi-cold mid-morning air. The small boy was standing outside this Christmas, wearing his usual green shirt with ridiculously long sleeves and blue pants. His yellow hair stuck up in a "U" shape as it always did.

If there was one thing you could say about Emerald, it's that he was observant. "Does it _ever_ snow here?" he asked Ruby.

A young coordinator just a little bit older than the small boy stood a few feet away from him, cutting some material from a piece of cloth and sewing it together. "Heh! Not since I've been living here. We're too far south."

Ruby backed up for a moment and adjusted his unusual hat as he tilted his head at the cloth he had just fixed. "You know…" he mused, "I think I like it!"

Emerald's attention immediately turned to the boy. "Really?! It's done?"

Ruby pushed his glasses back up against his face with a smile. "Done and _FABULOUS!"_

He picked the cloth up and twirled it around to reveal that it was actually a custom made hat. The hat was big and baggy, but it was designed in such a way as to lean back on the head, rather than remain firm. It was heavily padded on the inside for warmth, and it had a light green tint to it.

Ruby motioned for Emerald to come closer to him, and he placed the hat on his younger friend's head. "Just because it isn't freezing outside, doesn't mean you don't need a warm hat for the winter!" he reminded him, "Merry Christmas, Emerald!"

After adjusting the hat on his heat a little bit, Emerald looked up at his friend with a warm smile on his face. "Thanks, Ruby! I'm gonna go check to see if I can get used to this thing in the heat of battle!"

"Well… Alright, just make sure it doesn't get hit by any powerful attacks."

"Wouldn't that imply that my head was going to get hit with a powerful attack?"

Ruby sweatdropped a little. "Uh… I guess so… Just be careful."

"It's no biggie," Emerald assured, "I'm just gonna go out to the field with Red and Blue to practice a little. Wanna come with?"

"That's fine." He said,"I think I'll just go back in the house and relax for a bit. Besides, Nana needs some grooming."

"Yeah, suuuure. It's all about the mightyena." Emerald commented with a sarcastic tone.

"Huh? …What… are you talking about?" Ruby asked.

Emerald winked at him. "Just don't forget to give your girlfriend _her_ Christmas present this year." He began to walk away.

With that one sentence, Ruby's face turned completely red. "I… I already gave her a present this morning!" he shouted after the boy, "You were at the gift exchange! You saw it!"

Emerald paid no attention and simply walked off into the distance with his new hat on.

Ruby was still blushing ferociously. What did he know? Who needed snide comments like that? It was just a coincidence that he and Sapphire were the only ones left in the house at the moment… right?

The young coordinator walked back into the building slowly, thinking with each step. What if Emerald was right? He _was_ just left alone in the house with Sapphire. What if things got… romantic? He liked the girl and all. He loved her, but she could get kind of rough, and he _sucked_ at romance.

"Hey, Ruby!" he was greeted with a pounce.

A young trainer in a blue outfit with a neckerchief tied around her brown hair and two white gloves covering her hands immediately latched onto the boy as soon as he entered in the room. Her name was Sapphire. She was his girlfriend.

She gave the boy a light kiss on the cheek. "I thought you two were gonna die of starvation out there! …Where's Emerald?"

"Uh… he… he's gone." Ruby stuttered.

"Oh no!" she shouted with fear, "He _did_ starve to death?!"

"What? No! Not that kind of gone! He just… he's not here right now…"

Sapphire's eyes grew wide, and a sly smile came across her face. "You mean… we're alone now?"

Ruby began to shake. "Um… well, I wouldn't say alone…" he defended.

Sapphire brushed a stray strand of hair away from Ruby's eyes. "Really? Then what _would_ you call it?"

Ruby was _really _nervous now. His entire body went stiff, and he couldn't feel his feet anymore. He could not move.

Sapphire giggled as she turned her boy over and shoved him onto the living room couch, proceeding to cover his face with kisses as quickly and delicately as she possibly could.

It took a few seconds, but Ruby finally regained control of his body and began kissing his girlfriend back. She may have had him pinned down to the couch, but he couldn't resist making out with the girl after things had escalated this far.

Both of them laughed and giggled in the middle of the whole thing until Sapphire came down on her boyfriend for one long liplock. Her mouth closed tightly around Ruby's, and both parties were enjoying the kiss thoroughly when Ruby noticed something quite odd. His girlfriend smelt like chocolate.

He tried to say something about the strange smell, but his head was already shoved up against the bottom of the couch, and his arms were locked down by Sapphire's. He just had to wait until the kiss ended.

When Sapphire finally did let go, Ruby asked the question as soon as he got a breath of fresh air. "Why do you smell like chocolate?"

She looked down at him with a curious head tilt. "Um… What?"

"When you were kissing me a few seconds ago, I could have sworn I smelt chocolate."

"Oh!" she giggled, "Those are just from the cookies!"

She leaned back in for another kiss, but Ruby turned his head slightly to the side. "Cookies? What cookies?"

Sapphire sighed a little bit and leaned back up. "The Christmas cookies I found in the kitchen. You and Emerald were outside for forever. I got hungry."

"You what?!" Ruby cried, trying to sit up from his position. Sapphire moved off of the boy, and he squirmed up right. "Please tell me you aren't talking about the ones that were sitting on the counter shaped like pokemon!"

"Uh… yeah." She confirmed, "Why? What's wrong?"

Without a word, Ruby leapt from the couch and dashed into the kitchen. Horror filled his eyes when he noticed that the counter was covered in cookie crumbs, not a single one left over.

Sapphire casually walked in the room behind him. "Is there somethin' I should know about?"

Ruby grabbed his girlfriend by the shoulders, looking her in the eyes. "You ate _all of them?!_"

"Well, yeah," she smiled, "At first, I just wan'ed a snack, but they were so tasty, I couldn't help myself."

Ruby let go of her, and his eyes darted back to the empty counter. "Oh no. This is bad!"

"Ruby! What's up?" Sapphire finally demanded, stomping her foot on the ground.

The boy shot behind the counter in a flash, and he began to dig through the cabinets below for some cooking utensils.

"Those cookies were made by Yellow!" he called out, "It was some kind of special recipe!"

"So?"

His head emerged from the back of the counter. "Why do you think there were so many cookies just sitting on the counter, Sapphire?"

The trainer shrugged. "Cuz someone has really bad taste I guess."

Ruby facepalmed himself. "No! Yellow was up all night last night making those things! They're supposed to be for the party tonight!"

Sapphire gasped and covered her mouth. "Aw heck! I had no idea!"

"Well, now you do." Ruby responded as he pulled out a rolling pin and a cookie sheet.

"What 're we gonna to do?" the girl sobbed.

By this point, Ruby was running over to the fridge. He pulled out a gallon of milk and two sticks of butter.

"Well, _I'm_ going to fix the problem by making some new cookies!" he announced.

"…You know how ta make the same type of cookies that Yellow made?" his girlfriend asked.

Ruby turned around from the counter with a rolling pin in one hand and a sack of flower in the other, striking a victory pose. "Don't even worry about it," he assured, "I'm a master chef!"

Sapphire ran up to the coordinator and caught him in another embrace. "Oh! Thank you so much, Ruby! Now I don't have ta look like a complete monster!"

"Don't mention it," he smiled as he knelt down to retrieve more utensils from the cabinet, "It's all in a day's work!"

"How long do you think it'll be before Yellow gets back?"

He shrugged. "Green said she was taking her on a 'girl's shopping trip.' How long does that kind of thing normally last?"

"Weirdly enough…" Sapphire muttered, "I think you'd know that better than me."

Ruby went right back to work, pulling out a small bowl and cracking a few eggs into it. He searched the cabinet for a mixing spoon. When he found one he thought was sturdy enough, he plopped it into the bowl and began mixing ferociously.

Sapphire watched. Then, a sly smile grew on her face. She walked to the back of the counter with her boyfriend, and she began searching through the drawers as well.

It was half way through the stirring process that Ruby decided to open up the cabinet above him and search for a teaspoon. While he was shuffling through the jars and spices with one hand, he suddenly noticed that his stirring hand had hit something in the bowl. He turned his head around to see Sapphire also mixing in the bowl with a spatula.

"Sapphire…" he asked calmly, "What are you doing?"

"Helping!" She chirped with a grin.

Ruby was flattered, but he really didn't have the time for something like this if they were going to finish before Yellow returned.

"Look, I appreciate the thought," he murmured, "but you're stirring in the wrong direction… and with a spatula. I really don't need any-"

Sapphire put her hand over his mouth. "You do so need my help." She insisted, "Yellow and Green left hours ago. There's no way that you're going to remake all of those cookies in time without some help. I might not know how to cook, but you can just tell me what to do, okay?"

Ruby thought about it for a minute. It might actually be kind of fun, teaching his girlfriend how to cook. She was definitely right about the time aspect. To be honest, Ruby wasn't sure if they could get it done in time, regardless. His only fear was that they were going to somehow screw it up worse if there were _two _chefs in the kitchen.

"I won't take 'no' for an answer!" the girl smiled.

Well, that settled it then. Last time that Ruby told her 'no' after she said that, he got thrown across the room.

"Alright." He nodded, "Well, the next thing I'm gonna need is baking soda. Can you handle that?"

"I'm on it!" Sapphire cheered, as she ran to the other side of the kitchen.

A loud creaking noise emanated from the living room, causing Ruby to duck behind the counter in shock. It sounded like the front door had just opened. Sapphire was in _SOOO_ much trouble.

"Hello? Is anyone still in here?" a voice called from the front, but it did not sound like Yellow's voice. It sounded like Emerald!

"Emerald! We're in the kitchen!" Ruby called back, "Come give us a hand!"

The small boy wandered into the kitchen, his new hat still placed atop his head. He kept walking until he saw Ruby behind the counter.

"Hey! What are you doing back there?" he asked.

"Sapphire ate all of Yellow's cookies when you and I were outside earlier."

"You mean the ones that she spent all last night making?"

"Exactly." Ruby nodded, "I'm cooking a replacement batch so she won't get in trouble."

Emerald chuckled a little and leaned toward his friend. "Whipped." He whispered.

"Shut up!" Ruby shot back, "Are you gonna get back here and help us or what?"

"Well… I couldn't find Red, Blue, or any snow for a snowball fight outside…" Emerald began.

The boy struggled to pull himself up to the counter, and then he leaned his head over the side and looked around. "Where's Sapphire?"

Ruby looked to his right a little bit and saw the girl standing on the other side of the kitchen, looking into the oven.

"Oh, she's cooking something in the oven." He responded. "Wait… What?!"

Both boys ran over to the trainer to see what she was up to, and as they peered into the oven they saw a large bottle of Pop being melted inside.

"SAPPHIRE! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" Ruby screamed.

"You told me to bake some soda, right?" she clarified.

There was a small explosion inside of the oven, and the fizz from the "baking soda" actually shoved the door open, causing Pop to spill out everywhere.

Ruby's pupils shrank in the sight of the mess.

"No!" he screamed at the girl, "No! Baking soda is a powder! I didn't ask you to shove a two liter bottle of Soda Pop into the oven! Who would do that?"

"Is this what you're looking for?" asked Emerald as the boy held a bottle of foot powder up to his older friend.

"What?! No!" Ruby yelled again, "That's meant for athlete's foot! Why would anybody…" he stopped for a moment as he felt the sticky soda on the floor sink into his shoes. "Can someone please clean up the floor?"

"I'm on it." Emerald announced as he threw his pokeball to the ground and a large dusclops appeared.

"DUSCLOPS!" the pokemon cheered.

"Dusclops, can you use psychic to get this soda off of the floor?" Emerald requested.

The pokemon nodded its head to reply, and in just a moment, a glowing purple energy covered all of the liquid on the floor, causing it to rise to the air and be dumped in the sink.

"Hey! That's a great idea!" Sapphire commented, "We can use our pokemon ta help make the cookies faster!"

Ruby walked back over to his bowl and noticed a strange discoloration. He stuck his finger in the mix and brought it up to his mouth for a taste. It nearly caused him to throw up.

"Whaddaya think, Ruby?" Sapphire kept pressing, "Pokemon ta help us cook?"

His eyes narrowed on the girl. "You added the foot powder anyway, didn't you?"

"Sounds like a yes to me!" Emerald announced, throwing all of his pokeballs into the air.

"Alright, everybody, come on out!" Sapphire cheered, as she did the same.

In that one moment, a sceptile, a sudowoodo, a dusclops, a snorlax, a Mr. Mime, a mantine, an aggron, a blaziken, a donphan, and a tropius appeared in the kitchen with many mighty roars and screams and howls to announce their arrival.

Sapphire and Emerald were excited and happy about this, but Ruby was not. In fact, the coordinator nearly backed up to the wall when the kitchen became so crowded.

"Alright!" Emerald cried with enthusiasm, "Now, this is what I'm talking about!"

"Let's get cooking!" Sapphire suggested, "Whadda we do first, Ruby?"

* * *

The idea worked better than expected. Ruby would read off the ingredients that the people and the pokemon needed to go get, and they would go get them. They were required to bring the items by Ruby for inspection first, though, to prevent another foot powder incident. The team worked fast and surprisingly efficiently. There was one moment where Sapphire tried to hand Ruby a bag of potato chips drowned in chocolate syrup in response to his request for "chocolate chips," but the chocolified snack food did not make it past his a fore mentioned inspection, so it did not end up in the cookies. Instead, Sapphire just ate them at her leisure. When something inappropriate _did _somehow make its way into the food, dusclops' psychic attack was used to separate the ingredients. It was very useful to have Emerald's pokemon around.

After everything had been mixed and cut appropriately, Ruby put the cookies into the oven to bake for a few minutes.

"What do we do with the extra dough?" Emerald asked, tossing a ball of cookie dough into the air with his hand and catching it again, "I'm not sure if our current batch will get done before Yellow gets back, but there is no way we'll manage to make a second batch."

Ruby took the dough from the younger trainer. "I know what to do with it."

He balled it up tighter and threw it into Sapphire's face.

"Hey!" the girl shouted at him, "What was that for?"

"For eating the cookies in the first place!" he taunted, "I never should have left you alone with that stuff!"

The girl growled as she grabbed some more spare cookie dough from another sheet. "Oh yeah? Take this!"

Ruby was too fast, the cookie dough went over the coordinator's head and hit Sudowoodo instead.

"Hey!" Emerald chuckled, "Don't you dare hit my pokemon with that stuff!" He threw another ball of dough at Sapphire.

This time she dove out of the way and scooped up some more dough from behind her. "Either you're both with me or against me!"

Her eyes darted over to Ruby, "And I've already had a snowball fight with you. You know how this ends!"

Ruby rolled another piece of dough up behind his back as he leaned over to Emerald. "You wanted it to snow this year, right?"

"Right."

He threw another ball at Sapphire. "MERRY CHRISTMAS!"

A dough fight quickly broke out in the kitchen. Ruby and Emerald took one side, and Sapphire took the other. The pokemon of each trainer helped their trainer's team respectively. Ruby didn't even mind that his clothes were getting kind of dirty. They laughed and threw and rolled around for quite some time. Emerald eventually broke his alliance with Ruby and declared that he would be winning the doughball fight for himself. Nobody even noticed when Yellow and Green walked into the kitchen.

* * *

Both girls were covered in shopping bags when they entered the room, and neither knew what to make of what they saw. Three of their juniors had completely destroyed the kitchen with cookie dough and seemed to be doing a good job of continuing the escalation.

"Ummm… Should we stop them?" Yellow asked.

"Nah. Let them have their fun." Green responded, "Who are we to ruin a good old fashioned doughball fight?"

Yellow shrugged. "I was just hoping I could make it to the kitchen to get my present. I guess they seem to be having plenty of fun on their own, though."

"You left a present in there?"

Yellow smiled. "Well, you know how I wasn't able to make it to the gift exchange this morning?"

"Yeah." Green nodded.

"I was going to give all of my presents out at the party tonight, and those cookies that I kept saying were for everybody were actually my present to Sapphire."

"Oh…" Green looked behind the counter at the madness that was unfolding before them, "Do you remember where you put them in the kitchen?"

"Not a clue."

The girl shrugged. "Oh well, I'm sure you'll get them to her somehow. Right now let's talk about that new dress I got you."

"Right." Yellow nodded as they began to walk away.

"Trust me, your boyfriend is going to flip."

* * *

**Alright, time to clarify a few things. This chapter obviously takes place in some future that we have yet to see in _Pokemon Adventures_. This becomes obvious when we realize that Ruby and Sapphire are in a very official relationship, and at the end, we learn that Yellow is apparently dating somebody too. I don't know who Yellow is dating. I didn't ask her, but we can probably all guess. Next, yes, it is official that snow is not very common in many parts of the Hoenn region. It is the southernmost region we know of so far. Lastly, to quell your concerns, Glaceon Mage, I fully intend to fix the accent thing on the "e" at some point in the future, but I plan to do it all at once with all of my stories. I'm OCD like that, lol! So, I'm waiting for some free time first. Also, it is commonly debated as to when it is appropriate to capitalize a pokemon's name, but what I tend to do is only capitalize the first name if it is a proper name, like you would an animal. You will see this usage all the time in my writing. For instance, Ash has a pikachu, but Pikachu loves ketchup. As far as I know, there is no "official" rule on pokemon capitalization. Writers tend to just do what they want. If you know some sort of official guide, please direct me to it, and I will be happy to go through my stories and fix the mistakes. Again, thank you for reading! :)**


	6. A-Santa's Helpers

**Well, I'm back from quite a break. I did not intend for the break, and I'm gonna have to work my butt off to get the next few chapters out on time now, but oh well, that's life. You might be asking, "Hey! Where the heck were you the last few days?! You promised us chapters!" And, to put it simply, my family just went through a bit of a hectic pre-Christmas crisis. I wanted to update, but I'm sorry, guys, when my family is having the issues they were dealing with the past three days, they come first. I'm not going to go into detail about what happened, but it's all good now. Everything is fine, and we are back on track for the holidays. More good news, the world hasn't ended today yet! Yaaay! Merry Christmas, Day 6!**

* * *

**Santa's Helpers**

"You haven't told him yet?"

"Well… I… I don't think it's time, yet. Do you?"

Drew was a green haired pokemon coordinator from the Hoenn region. He was not used to the colder weather of Johto, but inside the pokemon center he was able to sport his normal black shirt and purple short-sleeved button up combo. His hands were currently touching his hips in a manner that suggested a bit of an attitude as he stared down his equally young brunette friend, May.

May spun the green bandana around her head with a single finger in a nervous fashion. "Well… it's just… he's only eight, right?"

Drew and May had been traveling together for a few months now, and May's younger brother, Max, had only recently joined them on their journey. Max was usually labeled as kind of a know-it-all, and he deserved to be. The dark haired boy was extremely intelligent for his age, as clearly indicated by his thick glasses and collared green shirt. This is why Drew was so shocked to find out that Max still believed in Santa Claus at his age.

"And… his father hasn't said anything yet?" Drew asked.

In truth, May's father, Norman, never _was_ a huge supporter of Santa Claus. It was her mother that kept Father Christmas alive in their house. May had often feared that it would come to this, a Christmas where she was somehow alone with Max and there was no one else around to play Santa.

"Well… it doesn't… really…" her voice murmured off into silence. She crossed her arms a little bit in defense.

Drew realized that May was in an uncomfortable place right now, and he walked over to his friend to give her a pat on the back for comfort. "Hey, don't worry about it." He assured, "I'll take care of the whole thing for you."

May perked up at the sound of that. "Really?" she smiled, "You'd do that for me, Drew?"

"Of course!" he shrugged, "What are friends for?"

"OH! Thank you so much!" she squealed as she clomped onto the boy with a giant hug, "I owe you _SO MUCH_ for this one!"

Drew was starting to blush from this position. "Hehe… Don't… mention it, May… I'll even take care of it right now!"

The girl pushed off of her friend in confusion. "Wait. How are you going to do it right now? It's like 2:00 pm."

"What's time gotta do with it?"

"Time has everything to do with it. It might be Christmas Eve, but Santa doesn't show up until late at night."

"Wait…" Drew stopped her, "I think there's a communication issue here. What do you think I'm going to do?"

This time May put her hands on_ her_ hips. "Every year at my house, my mom hires someone to show up dressed as Santa Claus to give us all our gifts. You just volunteered to do it for me."

"WOAH!" Drew yelled as he waved his hands in front of his face, "I was just offering to go break the news to Max that Santa doesn't exist! I was never offering to look like an idiot!"

"What?! Are you crazy?!" she shot back, "I don't want you to tell him Santa doesn't exist!"

"Well, why not? Mommy and Daddy aren't around. What'll they care?"

"Excuse me?" May was getting angry now, "Imagine if you let your little boy go off with his older sister on an adventure to another region! If he came back telling you that he didn't believe in Santa anymore, don't you think you'd be a little ticked?"

"I don't know!" Drew cried, "I've never had a kid!"

"Hey, May!" Max peeked his head into the bedroom, "Are we gonna wish Mom and Dad a 'merry Christmas' over the phone before we leave again tomorrow?"

"Umm… sure, Max…" she mumbled, trying to determine how much of the previous conversation her brother might have heard, "Are you okay with not being home this year?"

The boy simply smiled and gave his sister a small shrug, "I don't know why ya keep askin' me that, sis. I'm doing fine! It's kind of like a vacation."

May nodded. "You just miss Mom and Dad is all."

"Exactly." He confirmed, "It wouldn't be in the Christmas spirit to just ignore 'em. In fact, I'm gonna try to make a phone call to everyone I know tomorrow!"

"That's nice." She smiled at him.

"Alright, Max. We need to have a talk." Drew interrupted.

"Sure, Drew. What's up?"

"You know Santa-" May stopped her rival short by covering his mouth with her hands.

"Uhh… _What's_ up?" the kid asked again.

"Oh, it's nothing!" May chuckled, "Drew was just _shutting up_, right, Drew?"

The boy only grunted and growled in response as he tried to pull May's hands off of his face.

"Something about Santa, right?" Max prodded, "He's still gonna come tonight, isn't he?"

"Hehe, of- of course he is, Max!" May tried to defend, "He goes around the whole world on Christmas Eve!"

Drew was really getting his whole body into it now. He was about to push May over. "MMMM-MHMMH-FMHMMF!" he screamed.

"Alriiiight…" the boy continued, "What _were_ you going to tell me about Santa, then?"

"Oh, it's nothing." The coordinator chuckled, "It's just that… um… Santa has been working out a lot this year."

Max raised an eyebrow. "Working out?"

"Yeah…" May sat her eyes back on Drew, "In fact, he might seem a lot shorter this year than you're used to."

Drew's eyes narrowed. "MMM-FMHM!" he insisted.

"Is… that… it?" Max asked.

"Absolutely!" his sister chirped back, "Feel free to get back to… whatever it was you were doing!"

Max shrugged again as he slowly left the room. "Alright… Well, thanks…" He had some weird family.

As soon as the younger boy had safely departed from the room, May let go of Drew's mouth.

"WOAH!" he screamed as he began to gasp for any air, "May! …You've got one heck of a grip!"

The girl sweatdropped and rubbed the back of her neck a bit. "Yeah… Well, I guess you never know what you're capable of until you're put on the spot…"

After Drew had finally caught his breath, he looked May straight in the eyes again. "You _do_ realize that you've just delayed the inevitable, though?"

May almost spoke again, but Drew cut her short. "And I _am not_ wearing a Santa suit tonight!"

"Look," she volunteered, "my mom and dad will tell Max the truth when the time is right for them, but as for now, _you_ need to STAY OUT OF IT! It's none of your business!"

"Well, _I'M NOT WEARING A SANTA SUIT!_" he countered again.

"Fine!" May shouted, finally giving up the whole thing, "I'll just make a few phone calls tonight and see if I can get a fake Santa to show up, but you _do_ realize that under most circumstances, you would be crushing a little boys dreams, right?"

"Please. He's eight. In two years he'll be out traveling on his own." Drew began to walk out of the room, "You've gotta grow up eventually."

May simply watched the boy make his way into the hall. He could make her so furious sometimes! Drew had no idea how annoying he was!

The coordinator walked over to the red backpack that sat on her bed, and she pulled out a small pokegear device. If she was going to find a fake Santa on Christmas Eve, she was going to need to make _A LOT _of phone calls.

* * *

The night seemed to come faster than it normally did. In just a few hours, all of Johto was covered with a black, star speckled sky, along with a fair layer of snow, and inside the pokemon center, Max was getting restless.

"Alright!" the little boy cheered as he finished helping Nurse Joy decorate a beautifully large tree, "How long do you think it will be until Santa gets here?"

Joy smiled at him. "Well, dear, I was always told that Santa didn't come until all of the little children were in bed."

Max chuckled. "Well, maybe so, but you also don't decorate your tree until the very last second."

"Well, this is true." She said, giggling along with him, "I suppose everyone has different traditions."

Now, Max let out a _HUGE_ grin. "Santa visits me personally!"

"Oh, he does, does he?"

"Yep. My family's got connections."

Joy's smile slowly turned into a frown. "Well, honey, there's no _guarantee_ that he's going to come tonight, you know? He may not know where you are."

Max shrugged that suggestion off as he began toward the back hallway. "Nah, he's magic. He'll be fine."

* * *

May and Drew were back in their room again, discussing the night's plans.

"And he should be here any minute now." May finished with a smile.

Drew simply leaned against the wall with a sigh. "Nothing good will come of this."

"Oh, don't be such a Grinch!" she insisted, "I'm lucky to have even found this guy! He has an official suit, an official sled, and even an official beard! He demands payment on the spot!"

Drew smiled at that one. "Oh really? On the spot?"

"Yep." May smiled, "As soon as he shows up."

"Okay, then how do you plan on giving him the money right away without Max noticing?"

May's eyes grew wide. She hadn't thought of that yet.

"And speaking of that," Drew continued, "All of our presents are still in here, under your bed."

May's eyes darted over to her bunk this time. It was crammed with gift wrappings, shopping bags, and presents underneath. "Santa" did not have any of them. She hadn't thought of that either.

"Did you think _any_ _of this_ through?" Drew nagged, "Santa is going to walk through the door of the pokemon center with an empty bag and immediately ask 'Where's my money?' At least it'll be a Christmas Max never forgets."

"Oh no!" May whispered, "I… I've gotta find a way to get this stuff to him before he bursts through the front door looking like a crazy hobo thief!"

Drew laughed at that. "Sounds like a merry Christmas to me!"

"Hey, guys!" Max's voice echoed from down the hallway, "Get over to the lobby! I just finished the Christmas tree, and Santa will be here any minute!"

May began to freak out. "Oh no! Oh no! Oh no! What do I do?!"

"Get a hold of yourself!" Drew commanded, grabbing her by the shoulders, "Just bring the money and the presents out to the front of the center, and meet Santa there!"

"Right… right…" She calmed down a little. She ran to her bed and pulled the bundle of gifts out from underneath. "Okay, how do I get to the front of the center without Max noticing?"

Drew opened the room's window and motioned outward to his friend.

"Ugh!" She sighed, "You have _GOT _to be kidding me."

With no other real way out, May stumbled through the window and out into the snow with her arms full of presents.

"Alright, are you good?" Drew asked from the inside.

"Last chance to be the good guy and help!" May offered.

Drew pretended to think about it for a second, but he quickly dismissed the idea by slamming the window in May's face.

"Jerk!" she called back in, "I'm not even dressed for this!"

May would have kept yelling at the boy in vain, but she was interrupted by a stark "Ho Ho Ho!" coming from the front of the building. She left in a rush to investigate.

Sure enough, a fat man in a red suit with a white beard and a hat was making his way to the front of the pokemon center.

"I think I'd better give it one more practice…" he muttered. The man cleared his throat, complete with a slight amount of coughing. "Ho Ho Ho!"

"Excuse me! Excuse me, sir!" May announced as she ran up to the phony Saint Nick.

The man turned around to find a girl covered in presents charging for him.

"Hey! What's goin' on?"

May screeched to a halt without thinking, and everything she was holding came flying out of her hands and right into the face of the Santa Claus. The collision pushed him to the ground.

"Oops…" she whispered.

May bent over in a panic and took the presents from the ground. "I'm _SO sorry_!" she emphasized, "I've just been in such a panic, and Max is right inside the pokemon center, and you didn't have your money, and-" she stopped.

After lifting a present off of the man's face, she froze completely. The man was not responding or moving in anyway. He simply lay in the snow with his eyes closed. Only now did May realize that she had knocked Santa completely unconscious.

"OH MY GOSH!" She screamed, "What have I done?!" She pulled a few more boxed and bags off of the portly old man, and she tried to stand him up on your feet.

"Come on... Come on..." she muttered, "You're fine..."

He proved to be too heavy, and he fell over on the girl.

After fighting to get out from underneath the imposter, May was even colder than she had been earlier. After all, the guy _did_ just slam her into the snow. Shivering, the young coordinator reached into Santa's coat to try to find a pokegear or an ID or something.

"Well... I can't just leave you out here in the snow..." she admitted, but as she shuffled around in his pockets, all May could come across was a small business card.

The card clearly read:

_"Should something happen to me, put on the suit and board the sleigh. The stantler will know what to do."_

May shrugged and put the paper in her side fanny pack. "Stantler?"

The girl turned around to find a miniature sleigh with eight tiny stantler attached to the front via rope. "Oh boy... This guy goes all out..."

* * *

Drew was waiting.

It was just one of the typical "cool guy" things he did. He was waiting.

He was leaning up against the side wall of his bedroom at the pokemon center, waiting.

The boy smiled as he thought about the different things that might come out of this unusual predicament. He was either waiting to hear a man yell, "Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas!" from down the hall or hear a man yell, "Hey, everybody, I'm here ta play Santy Claus! Can someone tell me where I can find a 'May Maple?'" Either way, this was going to be good.

"Psst! Drew!"

Drew peeked up from his day dream. Where had that voice come from?

"Drew!"

It sounded like May. Drew turned his head around the room slowly, settling again on the only window. May was outside, covered in snow, tapping on the glass and biting her lower lip.

Things may have just gotten even more unusual.

The boy made his way over to the glass and opened the window silently.

"What's going on?" he whispered.

May did not respond with words, but, instead, she just ran back out into the snow, motioning for Drew in a very frantic manner.

The boy released a long sigh before he decided to go ahead and follow his friend.

May led Drew straight to the sleigh out back and showed him the unconscious Santa Claus that she had somehow managed to prop up against it.

Drew immediately busted into laughter. "What on Earth did you do?"

"I... I was just trying to give him the presents we needed..." she whispered solemnly.

"What how are you going to trick Max now?" he scoffed, "I mean, this guy is out _cold_. Pun intended."

May did not look at Drew. She turned her face to the ground and began to cry.

"Ok... May..." he began, "May... I didn't mean that you should cry."

"It's no use!" She sobbed, "You were right! In my infinite stupidity, I ended up ruining the only chance I had to keep Santa Claus alive in Max's eyes! There was never any way that this was going to end well! I screwed it all up..."

Drew pushed May's chin up as ice cold tears were still running down her cheeks. "Hey, I didn't mean it like that." he assured, "I'm sure everything will be fine. There's no reason to get upset like this. Max was bound to learn the truth eventually."

May just sobbed a little softer, pulling away from Drew's hand and pointing her face at the ground again.

The green haired coordinator let out his second long sigh of the day. "What size do you think this guy's suit is?"

* * *

Max was sitting in a soft chair in the pokemon center. It was one of those chairs that trainers often used when they were waiting for their pokemon to heal. He was just biding his time until Santa showed up, and, although the average onlooker might think differently, he could not contain his excitement.

When, all of the sudden, the pokemon center doors slid open, and in strode a short old man with a beard an suit. In only a moment, Max recognized Santa Claus.

"SANTA!" the little boy screamed with cheer.

Nurse Joy was almost completely asleep, but that woke her up with a startle. "HELLO, AND WELCOME TO THE POKEMON CENTER!" she began, but as her eyes fixed on the figure in the lobby she gasped in disbelief. "Santa Claus?!"

"Ho! Ho! Ho!" the jolly old man laughed, "Is there a little boy in here named Max?"

"IT'S ME, SANTA!" Max laughed as he ran over and hugged the skinnier version of his favorite gift giver, "DONCHA REMEMBER ME FROM LAST YEAR!"

"Oh, geeze..." the man muttered, "Uhh... Yes! Of course I do!" He let out another cheerful laugh, "You sure have grown a lot. Is your sister, May around?"

Max grinned. "She and her boyfriend decided to go to sleep early this Christmas. If you leave me with their presents, though, I'll be sure to deliver them tomorrow!"

_BOYFRIEND?!_ Drew growled a little bit, but then, to his surprise, May appeared outside of a window behind Max. She snapped her fingers a few times and then pointed at her brother with a determined and serious frown.

_'Pay Attention!'_ she was saying, _'Snap out of it, and remember what you're supposed to be doing!'_

Drew shook his head a few times and got back to the problem at hand. "Okay little boy. So, have you been good this year?"

Max was giving Santa a second look over, and he was becoming suspicious about what was going on. "Man... May wasn't kiddin' when she said you were working on your figure this year."

"Uhh... Weightwatchers." he replied with a sweatdrop. "There are some things even magic can't take care of?"

Max raised an eyebrow at this new Santa. "Well, why are you just getting thin now? You've been around for hundreds of years."

"Exactly! And Santa would like to be around for another few hundred years, thank you!" he grunted. Drew was getting tired of this. This whole episode needed to end. He started to reach in his sack of gifts. "Okay... You've been a very good boy this year, and I-"

"You know, I also notice that your beard is less flowy than normal..." Max continued.

Drew looked back at the window that May was in for advice. The girl just shrugged.

"Uhhh... Diabetes." Drew explained. May facepalmed herself. "Diabetes. Santa has diabetes from all of his cookies. That's why I'm on a diet this year. As you can see, it has already affected my beard."

Max was really thrown off by that one. "Ooookay... Then why is your hat on so tight?" he asked again, "I can't even see your snow white hair."

Drew pulled the hat on tighter. "Santa is going bald, and he is embarrassed.

May was now outside the window hitting herself with repetitive facepalms. This was not going well.

"Sooo... You're dieting, you have diabetes, and you're going bald?"

"It's been a rough year for Santa." he growled, "Now, can we just open your presents?"

"Hold on!" Max said one last time, "I'm just trying to verify here. I'm gonna ask you something only the _real_ Santa would know..."

Drew began to sweat. He looked over at May, who shrugged nervously again. "O...Okay..." he conceded.

Max looked at him with a completely serious complexion. "What did I get for Christmas last year?"

Drew sighed, and he looked over to the window, where May was motioning her hands up and down as if something were opening and closing. Then, she imitated a typing motion. Drew smiled.

"A laptop."

"YOU REALLY ARE SANTA!" the little boy cried, pulling Drew into an embrace.

At that moment, the young coordinator realized that dressing up as Santa was totally worth the fashion crime. He smiled. "Ho! Ho! Ho! Alright, let's acutually get to opening up your presents then, shall we?"

The rest of the night went off without a hitch, for the next few minutes, Drew handed Max his new Christmas presents, including the ones intended for him and May, and he laughed at the joyful sight of Max ripping into them with eagerness. Drew reminded Max to be good next year too, and he even gave Nurse Joy a hearty laugh and a 'merry Christmas.'

When things were all done, he began to walk outside the center, and Max began to follow him.

"Where do you think you're going, little boy?" he asked in a teasing voice.

Max shrugged. "To be honest, Santa, I kind of wanted to see your sleigh. Recently, I've been doubting whether you were even real of not."

Drew leaned down and spoke to Max on a personal level. "Santa is always real." he explained, "Every time you give a gift to someone or even do a good deed, not expecting anything in return, you have the spirit of good ol' Saint Nick inside you."

"Wow." Max gasped with a smile.

"But now I must be off! I can't have little boys sneaking rides on my sleigh!"

And with that, a bright light bursted through the outside door, the heat resonating inside and nearly onto Max's clothes. Then, when the boy could finally see through his squinting eyes again, Santa was gone.

The little boy ran back inside with an excited and renewed feeling in his heart, ready to play with his new toys.

* * *

"Well, did it work?"

Drew looked up to May, who was sitting on the roof of the pokemon center with his roselia next to her. The boy coordinator currently dangled from the end of a vine whip, half way up the side of the pokemon center.

"I think it actually went really well." he responded.

The girl helped him up to the very top of the center, and then she called her blaziken back into its pokeball. The trick they had pulled off was actually quite impressive. May had used Blaziken to shoot a burst of fire in front of Drew while he was standing at the center door, and then, before it cleared out of the way, Roselia vine whipped the boy up away from the door, making it appear as though a bright light had appeared and Santa had just vanished.

"Now, doesn't it feel good to be the good guy?" May asked.

Drew smiled. "Well, don't get used to it." he looked back to the ground, "Hey... Where did Santa go?"

May peered into the snow as well to notice the man and his sleigh from earlier had disappeared completely. "I guess he just ran off. I didn't even get to pay-"

Her pokegear rang. The coordinator answered it with a shocked expression.

"What's up?" Drew asked.

"It's the Santa I hired..." she began, "...He says he can't make it tonight."

"But... who.,,?"

Both coordinators looked up in the sky for a sleigh.

* * *

**Author's Note: Dear valued reader, please forgive me for my inability to finish this fic before Christmas. Things got out of hand. As a result, I will be putting this fic on hiatus, effective immediately. We will return to "_12 Christmases_" again next year, when the holiday season is cheery and ready! But I can not and will not finish this story outside of the Christmas season. It just doesn't seem right to me. I need my holiday magic.**

**-Thanks,  
**

**Could Not Think of a Good Name  
**


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